They turned and looked at her.
"She"s "is mother," said a voice. "Let "er through."
"Mother be blowed!" said another voice, hoa.r.s.ely. "Get out! She"s "is _wife_."
"Yes," she cried eagerly. "Yes! Oh, do let me through! I am his wife."
Suddenly she knew it was true. The Boy"s great love had made her his wife. Had he not said: "You and I are one, Christobel; eternally, indissolubly _one_. You will find it out, when it is too late"?
The crowd parted, making a way for her, straight to the foot of the breakwater.
She mounted it, and walked towards the empty stretcher.
The coast-guardsman confronted her.
"He is mine," she said, quietly. "I have the right to be here."
The man saluted, in respectful silence.
She stood gazing out to where the crowd of boats hovered about the great insect with broken wings.
The sea gleamed golden in the sunset.
One boat, larger than the rest, slowly detached itself from the general melee, pulling with measured stroke toward the breakwater.
Something lay very still in the bow, covered with a sail-cloth.
Two coast-guardsmen rowed; one steered.
The boat came toward the breakwater, in a shaft of sunlight.
Christobel turned to the man beside her.
"Is there any hope?" she asked.
""Fraid not, lady. My mate just signalled: all U P."
"Ah!" she said, looking wide-eyed into his face. "Ah!--But there must be pioneers."
The coast-guardsman turned and walked toward the crowd.
"She"s "is wife, men," he said, with a jerk of his thumb over his shoulder. "She"s "is wife; yet when I told her it was all U P, she said: "There must be pioneers.""
The crowd of roughs doffed their caps.
The boat drew slowly nearer.
Then she saw the Professor, hurrying down the shingle, waving his umbrella.
He must not come yet.
She advanced to the sh.o.r.e end of the breakwater, and spoke to the crowd.
"Please," she said, "oh, please, if possible, prevent that gentleman from reaching the breakwater."
They turned, and saw the advancing figure of the Professor, flurried and irate.
""Ullo, Bill," cried a voice. "She says: Don"t let the old bloke through."
They pa.s.sed the word from one to the other. "Don"t let the old bloke through." They closed the outer ranks, standing shoulder to shoulder.
The Professor"s umbrella waved wildly on the outskirts.
She moved along the breakwater. Yes, that was it. "Don"t let the old bloke through." She had never used such a word in her life before, but it just met the needs of the case. "Don"t let the old bloke through."
The boat drew nearer.
A bugle, away up on the cliff, sounded the call to arms.
"Little Boy Blue, come blow me your horn! The cow"s in the meadow; the sheep, in the corn. Where is the boy who looks after the sheep? Ah, dear G.o.d! Where is the Boy? Where is the Boy? Where is the Boy?--He"s under the sailcloth--fast asleep."
The boat drew nearer. She could hear the measured plash of the oars; the rhythmic rattle of the rowlocks. They advanced, to the beat of the words in her brain.
"There must--be pion--eers! Don"t let the old bloke through. Oh, where is the boy who looks after the sheep? He"s under the sail-cloth, fast asleep."
The boat drew level with the breakwater, grating against it.
"Under the sail-cloth, Boy dear; under the sail-cloth--fast asleep."
Tenderly, carefully, they lifted their burden. As the boat rocked, and their feet shuffled beneath the weight, she closed her eyes. When she opened them once more, the quiet Thing under the sail-cloth lay upon the stretcher. Every man within sight stood silent and bareheaded.
The bugle on the cliff sounded: "lights out."
The golden shaft of sunlight died from off the sea.
Then she came forward, and knelt beside her Boy.
Suddenly she understood the cry of anguish wrung from the loving heart of a woman at a tomb: "Tell me where thou hast laid Him, and I will take Him away!" Oh, faithful heart of woman, alike through all the ages; ready, with superhuman effort, to prove a limitless love and a measureless grief!
She knelt beside the stretcher, and lifted the sail-cloth.
Yes, it was the Boy--her own Little Boy Blue.
His curly hair was matted with blood and salt water. There was a deep gash across his temple, from the ear, right up into the hair His eyes were closed; but his lips smiled, triumphant. "There must be pioneers!
Every good life given, advances the cause." "Yes, Little Boy Blue.
But has it ever struck you, that, if you marry, your wife will most probably want you to give up flying; not being able to bear that a man who was her ALL, should do these things?" She lifted the sail-cloth quite away, and stood looking down upon him, so shattered, yet so beautiful, in his triumphant sleep.
Suddenly her arm was seized from behind. She turned.
The Professor had succeeded in pushing his way through the crowd, and in mounting the breakwater. His cravat was awry; his top-hat was on the back of his head. He looked at her through his gla.s.ses, in amazed indignation.