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Page 86
But because, contrary to the boy's belief, none of us is quite good
or quite evil, he was kind to the boy. The khaki stood for something
which no Englishman could ignore.
"Poor little devil!" he said on the last day in the smoking room,
"he's going to a bad time, all right. I was in Africa for eight
years. Boer war and the rest of it. Got run through the thigh in a
native uprising, and they won't have me now. But Africa was cheery
to this war."
He asked the boy into the smoking room, which he had hitherto
avoided. He had some queer idea that he did not care to take his
uniform in there. Absurd, of course. It made him rather lonely in
the hours Edith spent in her cabin, preparing variations of costume
for the evening out of her small trunk. But he was all man, and he
liked the society of men; so he went at last, with Lethway, and
ordered vichy!
He had not allowed himself to think much beyond the end of the
voyage. As the ship advanced, war seemed to slip beyond the edge of
his horizon. Even at night, as he lay and tossed, his thoughts were
either of the next day, when he would see Edith again, or of that
indefinite future when he would return, covered with honors, and go
to her, wherever she was.
He never doubted the honors now. He had something to fight for. The
medals in their cases looked paltry to him, compared with what was
coming. In his sleep he dreamed of the V.C., dreams he was too
modest to put into thoughts in waking hours.
Then they reached the Mersey. On the last evening of the voyage he
and Edith stood on the upper deck. It was a zone of danger. From
each side of the narrowing river flashlights skimmed the surface of
the water, playing round but never on the darkened ship. Red and
green lights blinked signals. Their progress was a devious one
through the mine-strewn channel. There was a heavy sea even there,
and the small lights on the mast on the pilot boat, as it came to a
stop, described great arcs that seemed, first to starboard, then to
port, to touch the very tips of the waves.
"I'm not crazy about this," the girl said, as the wind tugged at her
skirts. "It frightens me. Brings the war pretty close, doesn't it?"
Emotion swelled his heart and made him husky--love and patriotism,
pride and hope, and a hot burst of courage.
"What if we strike a mine?" she asked.
"I wouldn't care so much. It would give me a chance to save you."
Overhead they were signalling the shore with a white light. Along
with the new emotions that were choking him came an unaccustomed
impulse of boastfulness.
"I can read that," he said when she ignored his offer to save her.
"Of course it's code, but I can spell it out."
He made a move to step forward and watch the signaler, but she put
her hand on his arm.
"Don't go. I'm nervous, Cecil," she said.
She had called him by his first name. It shook him profoundly, that
and the touch of her hand on his arm.
"Oh, I love you, love you!" he said hoarsely. But he did not try to
take her in his arms, or attempt to caress the hand that still clung
to him. He stood very erect, looking at the shadowy outline of her.
Then, her long scarf blowing toward him, he took the end of it and
kissed that very gravely.
"I would die for you," he said.
Then Lethway joined them.
III
London was not kind to him. He had felt, like many Canadians, that
in going to England he was going home. But England was cold.
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