The Trumpeter Swan

CHAPTER I

A MA­JOR AND TWO MI­NORS

I

It had rained all night, one of the sum­mer rains that, be­gin­ning in a thun­der-​storm in Wash­ing­ton, had con­tin­ued in a steam­ing driz­zle un­til morn­ing.

There were on­ly four pas­sen­gers in the sleep­er, men all of them--two in ad­join­ing sec­tions in the mid­dle of the car, a third in the draw­ing-​room, a fourth an in­ter­mit­tent oc­cu­pant of a berth at the end. They had gone to bed un­aware of the es­tate or cir­cum­stance of their fel­low-​trav­ellers, and had waked to find the train de­layed by washouts, and side-​tracked un­til more could be learned of the con­di­tion of the road.

The man in the draw­ing-​room shone, in the few glimpses that the oth­ers had of him, with an ef­ful­gence which was daz­zling. His valet, the in­ter­mit­tent sleep­er in the end berth, was a smug lit­tle soul, with a small nose which point­ed to the stars. When the door of the com­part­ment opened to ad­mit break­fast there was the ra­di­ance of a bro­cade dress­ing-​gown, the shine of a sleek head, the stac­ca­to of an im­pe­ri­ous voice.

Randy Paine, long and lank, in fad­ed kha­ki, rose, leaned over the seat of the sec­tion in front of him and drawled, “'It is not rain­ing rain to me--it's rain­ing ros­es--down----'”

A pleas­ant laugh, and a deep voice, “Come around here and talk to me. You're a Vir­gini­an, aren't you?”

“By the grace of God and the dis­crim­ina­tion of my an­ces­tors,” young Ran­dolph, as he dropped in­to the seat op­po­site the man with the deep voice, salut­ed the dead and gone Paines.

“Then you know this part of it?”

“I was born here. In this coun­ty. It is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh,” there was a break in the boy's voice which robbed the words of grandil­oquence.

“Hum--you love it? Yes? And I am greedy to get away. I want wider spaces----”

“Cal­ifor­nia?”

“Yes. Haven't seen it for three years. I thought when the war was over I might. But I've got to be near Wash­ing­ton, it seems. The heat drove me out, and some­body told me it would be cool in these hills----”

“It is, at night. By day we're not stren­uous.”

“I like to be stren­uous. I hate in­ac­tion.”

He moved rest­less­ly. There was a crutch by his side. Young Paine no­ticed it for the first time. “I hate it.”

He had a strong frame, broad shoul­ders and thin hips. One placed him im­me­di­ate­ly as a man of great phys­ical force. Yet there was the crutch. Randy had seen oth­er men, broad-​shoul­dered, thin-​hipped, who had come to worse than crutch­es. He did not want to think of them. He had es­caped with­out a scratch. He did not be­lieve that he had lacked courage, and there was a dec­ora­tion to prove that he had not. But when he thought of those oth­er men, he had no sense of his own val­or. He had giv­en so lit­tle and they had giv­en so much.

Yet it was not a thing to speak of. He struck, there­fore, a note to which he knew the oth­er might re­spond.

“If you haven't been here be­fore, you'll like the old places.”

“I am go­ing to one of them.”

“Which?”

“King's Crest.”

A mo­ment's si­lence. Then, “That's my home. I have lived there all my life.”

The lame man gave him a sharp glance. “I heard of it in Wash­ing­ton--de­light­ful at­mo­sphere--and all that----”

“You are go­ing as a--pay­ing guest?”

“Yes.”

A deep flush stained the younger man's face. Sud­den­ly he broke out. “If you knew how rot­ten it seems to me to have my moth­er keep­ing--board­ers----”

“My dear fel­low, I hope you don't think it is go­ing to be rot­ten to have me?”

“No. But there are oth­er peo­ple. And I didn't know un­til I came back from France---- She had to tell me when she knew I was com­ing.”

“She had been do­ing it all the time you were away?”

“Yes. Be­fore I went we had mort­gaged things to help me through the Uni­ver­si­ty. I should have fin­ished in a year if I hadn't en­list­ed. And Moth­er in­sist­ed there was enough for her. But there wasn't with the in­ter­est and ev­ery­thing--and she wouldn't sell an acre. I shan't let her keep on----”

“Are you go­ing to turn me out?”

His smile was ir­re­sistible. Randy smiled back. “I sup­pose you think I'm a fool----?”

“Yes. For be­ing ashamed of it.”

Randy's head went up. “I'm not ashamed of the board­ing-​house. I am ashamed to have my moth­er work.”

“So,” said the lame man, soft­ly, “that's it? And your name is Paine?”

“Ran­dolph Paine of King's Crest. There have been a lot of us--and not a pik­er in the lot.”

“I am Mark Prime.”

“Ma­jor Prime of the 135th?”

The oth­er nod­ded. “The won­der­ful 135th--God, what men they were----” his eyes shone.

Randy made his lit­tle ges­ture of salute. “They were that. I don't won­der you are proud of them.”

“It was worth all the rest,” the Ma­jor said, “to have known my men.”

He looked out of the win­dow at the driz­zle of rain. “How qui­et the world seems af­ter it all----”

Then like the snap of bul­lets came the stac­ca­to voice through the open door of the com­part­ment.

“Find out why we are stop­ping in this beast­ly hole, Kemp, and get me some­thing cold to drink.”

Kemp, sail­ing down the aisle, like a Lil­liputian drum ma­jor, tripped over Randy's foot.

“Beg par­don, sir,” he said, and sailed on.

Randy looked af­ter him. “'His Mas­ter's voice----'”

“And to think,” Prime re­marked, “that the cold­est thing he can get on this train is gin­ger ale.”

Kemp, com­ing back with a gold­en bot­tle, with cracked ice in a tall glass, with a crisp curl of lemon peel, ready for an in­nocu­ous li­ba­tion, brought his nose down from the heights to look for the foot, found that it no longer barred the way, and marched on to hid­den mu­sic.

“Leave the door open, leave it open,” snapped the voice, “isn't there an elec­tric fan? Well, put it on, put it on----”

“He drinks nec­tar and com­plains to the gods,” said the Ma­jor soft­ly, “why can't we, too, drink?”

They had theirs on a ta­ble which the porter set be­tween them. The train moved on be­fore they had fin­ished. “We'll be in Char­lottesville in less than an hour,” the con­duc­tor an­nounced.

“Is that where we get off, Paine?”

“One mile be­yond. Are they go­ing to meet you?”

“I'll get a sta­tion wag­on.”

Young Paine grinned. “There aren't any. But if Moth­er knows you're com­ing she'll send down. And any­how she ex­pects me.”

“Af­ter a year in France--it will be a warm wel­come----”

“A wet one, but I love the rain, and the red mud, ev­ery bloom­ing inch of it.”

“Of course you do. Just as I love the dust of the desert.”

They spoke, each of them, with a sort of tense calm­ness. One doesn't con­fess to a lump in one's throat.

The lit­tle man, Kemp, was brush­ing things in the aisle. He was hot but un­con­quered. Hav­ing laid out the be­long­ings of the man he served, he took a sud­den re­cess, and came back with a fresh col­lar, a wet but fault­less pom­padour, and a sus­pi­cion of pow­der on his small nose.

“All right, sir, we'll be there in fif­teen min­utes, sir,” they heard him say, as he was swal­lowed up by the yawn­ing door.

II

Fif­teen min­utes lat­er when the train slowed up, there emerged from the draw­ing-​room a man some years old­er than Ran­dolph Paine, and many years younger than Ma­jor Prime. He was good-​look­ing, well-​dressed, but ap­par­ent­ly in a very bad tem­per. Kemp, in an ex­cit­ed, Skye-​ter­ri­er man­ner, had got­ten the bags to­geth­er, had a rain­coat over his arm, had an um­brel­la handy, had ap­par­ent­ly fore­seen ev­ery con­tin­gen­cy but one.

“Great guns, Kemp, why are we get­ting off here?”

“The con­duc­tor said it was near­er, sir.”

Ran­dolph Paine was al­ready hang­ing on the step, ready to drop the mo­ment the train stopped. He had giv­en the porter an ex­tra tip to look af­ter Ma­jor Prime. “He isn't used to that crutch, yet. He'd hate it if I tried to help him.”

The rain hav­ing driz­zled for hours, con­densed sud­den­ly in a down­pour. When the train moved on, the men found them­selves in a small and stuffy wait­ing-​room. Around the sta­tion plat­form was a sea of red mud. Misty hills shot up in a cir­cle to the hori­zon. There was not a house in sight. There was not a soul in sight ex­cept the agent who knew young Paine. No one hav­ing come to meet them, he sug­gest­ed the use of the tele­phone.

In the mean­time Kemp was hav­ing a hard time of it. “Why in the name of Heav­en didn't we get off at Char­lottesville,” his mas­ter was de­mand­ing.

“The con­duc­tor said this was near­er, sir,” Kemp re­peat­ed. His re­sponse had the bound­ing qual­ity of a rub­ber ball. “If you'll sit here and make your­self com­fort­able, Mr. Dal­ton, I'll see what I can do.”

“Oh, it's a beast­ly hole, Kemp. How can I be com­fort­able?”

Randy, who had come back from the tele­phone with a look on his face which clutched at Ma­jor Prime's throat, caught Dal­ton's com­plaint.

“It isn't a beast­ly hole,” he said in a ring­ing voice, “it's God's coun­try---- I got my moth­er on the 'phone, Ma­jor. She has sent for us and the hors­es are on the way.”

Dal­ton looked him over. What a lank and shab­by youth he was to car­ry in his voice that ring of au­thor­ity. “What's the an­swer to our get­ting off here?” he asked.

“De­pends up­on where you are go­ing.”

“To Os­car Wa­ter­man's----”

“Nev­er heard of him.”

“Hamil­ton Hill,” said the sta­tion agent.

Randy's neck stiff­ened. “Then the Hamil­tons have sold it?”

“Yes. A Mr. Wa­ter­man of New York bought it.”

Kemp had come back. “Mr. Wa­ter­man says he'll send the car at once. He is de­light­ed to know that you have come, sir.”

“How long must I wait?”

“Not more than ten min­utes, he said, sir,” Kemp's op­ti­mism seemed to ric­ochet against his mas­ter's hard­ness and come back un­hurt. “He will send a closed car and will have your rooms ready for you.”

“Serves me right for not wiring,” said Dal­ton, “but who would be­lieve there is a place in the world where a man can't get a taxi?”

Young Paine was at the door, lis­ten­ing for the sound of hoofs, watch­ing with im­pa­tience. Sud­den­ly he gave a shout, and the oth­ers looked to see a small ob­ject which came whirling like a bomb through the mist.

“Nel­lie, lit­tle old la­dy, lit­tle old la­dy,” the boy was on his knees, the dog in his arms--an ec­stat­ic, pant­ing crea­ture, the first to wel­come her mas­ter home!

Be­fore he let her go, the lit­tle dog's coat was wet with more than rain, but Randy was not ashamed of the tears in his eyes as he faced the oth­ers.

“I've had her from a pup--she's a faith­ful beast. Hel­lo, there they come. Gee, Jef­fer­son, but you've grown! You are al­most as big as your name.”

Jef­fer­son was the ne­gro boy who drove the hors­es. There was a great splash­ing of red mud as he drew up. The flaps of the sur­rey closed it in.

Jef­fer­son's eyes were twin­kling beads as he greet­ed his mas­ter. “I sure is glad to see you, Mr. Randy. Miss Car­oline, she say there was an­oth­er gemp'mun?”

“He's here--Ma­jor Prime. You run in there and look af­ter his bags.”

Randy un­but­toned the flaps and gave a gasp of as­ton­ish­ment:

“_Becky_--Becky Ban­nis­ter!”

In an­oth­er mo­ment she was out on the plat­form, and he was hold­ing her hands, protest­ing in the mean­time, “You'll get wet, my dear----”

“Oh, I want to be rained on, Randy. It's so heav­en­ly to have you home. I caught Jef­fer­son on the way down. I didn't even wait to get my hat.”

[Il­lus­tra­tion: “IT'S SO HEAV­EN­LY TO HAVE YOU HOME”]

She did not need a hat. It would have hid­den her hair. George Dal­ton, watch­ing her from the door, de­cid­ed that he had nev­er seen such hair, bronze, part­ed on the side, with a thick wave across the fore­head, it shad­ed eyes which were clear wells of light.

She was a lit­tle thing with a qual­ity in her youth which made one think of the year at the spring, of the day at morn, of Bot­ti­cel­li's Si­mon­et­ta, of Shel­ley's lark, of Wordsworth's daf­fodils, of Keats' Eve of St. Agnes--of all the love­ly ra­di­ant things of which the po­ets of the world have sung----

Of course Dal­ton did not think of her in quite that way. He knew some­thing of Brown­ing and lit­tle of Keats, but he had at least the wit to dis­cern the rareness of her type.

As for the rest, she wore fad­ed blue, which melt­ed in­to the blue of the mists, stubbed and shab­by rus­set shoes and an air of ab­sorp­tion in her re­turned sol­dier. This ab­sorp­tion Dal­ton found him­self sub­con­scious­ly re­sent­ing. Fol­low­ing an in­stinc­tive urge, he emerged, there­fore, from his chrysalis of ill-​tem­per, and smiled up­on a trans­formed uni­verse.

“My rain­coat, Kemp,” he said, and strode forth across the plat­form, a crea­ture as shin­ing and splen­did as ev­er trod its boards.

Becky, be­hold­ing him, asked, “Is that Ma­jor Prime?”

“No, thank Heav­en.”

Jef­fer­son, steer­ing the Ma­jor ex­pert­ly, came up at this mo­ment. Then, splash­ing down the red road whirled the gor­geous limou­sine. There were two men on the box. Kemp, who had been flut­ter­ing around Dal­ton with an um­brel­la, dart­ed in­to the wait­ing-​room for the bags. The door of the limou­sine was opened by the foot­man, who al­so had an um­brel­la ready. Dal­ton hes­itat­ed, his eyes on that shab­by group by the mud-​stained sur­rey. He made up his mind sud­den­ly and ap­proached young Paine.

“We can take one of you in here. You'll be crowd­ed with all of those bags.”

“Not a bit. We'll man­age per­fect­ly, thank you,” Randy's voice dis­missed him.

He went, with a lin­ger­ing glance back­ward. Becky, catch­ing that glance, waked sud­den­ly to the fact that he was very good-​look­ing. “It was kind of him to of­fer, Randy.”

“Was it?”

Noth­ing more was said, but Becky won­dered a bit as they drove on. She liked Ma­jor Prime. He was an old dear. But why had Randy thanked Heav­en that the oth­er man was not the Ma­jor?

III

The Wa­ter­man mo­tor passed the sur­rey, and Dal­ton, strain­ing his eyes for a glimpse of the pret­ty girl, was re­ward­ed on­ly by a view of Randy on the front seat with his back turned on the world, while he talked with some­one hid­den by the cur­tains.

Per­haps the fact that she was hid­den by the cur­tains kept Dal­ton's thoughts up­on her. He felt that her beau­ty must shine even among the shad­ows--he en­vied Ma­jor Prime, who sat next to her.

The Ma­jor was aware that his po­si­tion was en­vi­able. It was worth much to watch these two young peo­ple, ea­ger in their re­union. “Becky Ban­nis­ter, whom I have known all my life,” had been Randy's pre­sen­ta­tion of the lit­tle la­dy with the shin­ing hair.

“Grand­fa­ther doesn't know that I came, or Aunt Clau­dia. They felt that your moth­er ought to see you first and so did I. Un­til the last minute. Then I saw Jef­fer­son driv­ing by--I was down at the gate to wave to you, Randy--and I just came----” her gay laugh was in­fec­tious--the men laughed with her.

“You must let me out when we get to Hunters­field, and you mustn't tell--ei­ther of you. We are all to dine to­geth­er to-​night at your house, Randy, and when you meet me, you are to say--'_Becky_'--just as you did to-​day, as if I had fall­en from the skies.”

“Well, you did fall--straight,” Randy told her. “Becky, you are too good to be true; oh, you're too pret­ty to be true. Isn't she, Ma­jor?”

“It is just be­cause I am--Amer­ican. Are you glad to get back to us, Randy?”

“Glad,” he drew a long breath. Nel­lie, who had wedged her­self in tight­ly be­tween her mas­ter and Jef­fer­son, wrig­gled and licked his hand. He looked down at her, tried to say some­thing, broke a lit­tle on it, and end­ed abrupt­ly, “It's Heav­en.”

“And you weren't hurt?”

“Not a scratch, worse luck.”

She turned to Ma­jor Prime and did the wise thing and the thing he liked. “You were,” she said, sim­ply, “but I am not go­ing to be sor­ry for you, shall I?”

“No,” he said, “I am not sor­ry for--my­self----”

For a mo­ment there was si­lence, then Becky car­ried the con­ver­sa­tion in­to lighter cur­rents. “Ev­ery­body is here for the Horse Show next week. Your moth­er's house is full, and those aw­ful Wa­ter­man peo­ple have guests.”

“One of them came down with us.”

“The good-​look­ing man who of­fered us a ride?”

“Oh, of course if you like that kind of looks, he's the kind of man you'd like,” said Randy, “but com­ing down he seemed rather out of tune with the uni­verse.”

“How out of tune?”

“Well, it was hot and he was hot----”

“It _is_ hot, Randy, and per­haps he isn't used to it.”

“Are you mak­ing ex­cus­es for him?”

“I don't even know him.”

Ma­jor Prime in­ter­posed. “His man was a cork­ing lit­tle chap, nev­er turned a hair, as cool as a cu­cum­ber, with ev­ery­body else siz­zling.”

They were as­cend­ing a hill, and the horse went slow­ly. Ahead of them was a bug­gy with­out a top. In the bug­gy were a man and a wom­an. The wom­an had an um­brel­la over her, and a child in her arms.

“It's Mary Flip­pin and her fa­ther. See if you can't over­take them, Jef­fer­son. I want you to see Fid­dle Flip­pin, Randy.”

“Who is Fid­dle Flip­pin?”

“Mary's lit­tle girl. Mary is a war bride. She was in Pe­ters­burg teach­ing school when the war broke out, and she mar­ried a man named Branch. Then she came home--and she called the ba­by Fi­deli­ty.”

“I hope he was a good hus­band.”

“No­body has seen him, he was or­dered away at once. But she is very proud of him. And the ba­by is a dar­ling. Just be­gin­ning to walk and talk.”

“Stop a minute, Jef­fer­son, while I speak to them.”

Mr. Flip­pin pulled up his fat horse. He was black-​haired, rud­dy, and wide of girth. “Well, well,” he said, with a big laugh, “it is cert'n'y good to see you.”

Mary Flip­pin was slen­der and del­icate and her eyes were blue. Her hair was thick and dark. There was Scotch-​Irish blood in the Flip­pins, and Mary's charm was in that of dusk­iness of hair and blue­ness of eye. “Oh, Randy Paine,” she said, with her cheeks flam­ing, “when did you get back?”

“Ten min­utes ago. Mary, if you'll hand me that cork­ing kid, I'll kiss her.”

Fid­dle was hand­ed over. She was rosy and round with her moth­er's blue eyes. She wore a lit­tle but­toned hat of white piqué, with strings tied un­der her chin.

“So,” said Randy, af­ter a moist kiss, “you are Fid­dle-​dee-​dee?”

“Ess----”

“Who gave you that name?”

“It is her own way of say­ing Fi­deli­ty,” Mary ex­plained.

“Isn't she rather young to say any­thing?”

“Oh, Randy, she's a year and a half,” Becky protest­ed. “Your moth­er says that you talked in your cra­dle.”

Randy laughed, “Oh, if you lis­ten to Moth­er----”

“I'm glad you're in time for the Horse Show,” Mr. Flip­pin in­ter­posed, “I've got a cou­ple of prize hawgs--an' when you see them, you'll say they ain't any­thing like them on the oth­er side.”

“Oh, Fa­ther----”

“Well, they ain't. I reck­on Vir­ginia's good enough for you to come back to, ain't it, Mr. Randy----?”

“It is good enough for me to stay in now that I'm here.”

“So you're back for good?”

“Yes.”

“Well, we're mighty glad to have you.”

Fid­dle Flip­pin, danc­ing and dou­bling up on Randy's knee like a very soft doll, sud­den­ly held out her arms to her moth­er.

As Mary leaned for­ward to take her, Randy was aware of the change in her. In the old days Mary had been a gay lit­tle thing, with an im­per­ti­nent tongue. She was not gay now. She was a Madon­na, ten­der-​eyed, brood­ing over her child.

“She has changed a lot,” Randy said, as they drove on.

“Why shouldn't she change?” Becky de­mand­ed.

“Wouldn't any wom­an change if she had loved a man and had let him go to France?”

IV

It was still rain­ing hard when the sur­rey stopped at a high and rusty iron gate flanked by brick pil­lars over­grown with Vir­ginia creep­er.

“Becky,” said young Paine, “you can't walk up to the house. It's pour­ing.”

“I don't see any house,” said Ma­jor Prime.

“Well, you nev­er do from the road in this part of the coun­try. We put our hous­es on the tops of hills, and have acres to the right of us, and acres to the left, and acres in front, and acres be­hind, and you can nev­er vis­it your neigh­bors with­out go­ing miles, and no­body ev­er walks ex­cept lit­tle Becky Ban­nis­ter when she runs away.”

“And I am go­ing to run now,” said Becky. “Randy, there's a rain­coat un­der that seat. I'll put it on if you will hand it out to me.”

“You are go­ing to ride up, my dear child. Drive on, Jef­fer­son.”

“Randy, _please_, your moth­er is wait­ing. She didn't come down to the sta­tion be­cause she said that if she wept on your shoul­der, she would not do it be­fore the whole world. But she is _wait­ing_---- And it isn't fair for me to hold you back a minute.”

He yield­ed at last re­luc­tant­ly. “Re­mem­ber, you are to act as if you had nev­er met me,” she said to Ma­jor Prime as she gave him her hand at part­ing, “when you see me to-​night.”

“Becky,” Randy asked, in a sud­den pan­ic, “are the board­ers to be drawn up in ranks to wel­come me?”

“No, your moth­er has giv­en you and Ma­jor Prime each two rooms in the School­house, and we are to dine out there, in your sit­ting-​room--our fam­ilies and the Ma­jor. And there won't be a soul to see you un­til morn­ing, and then you can show your­self off by inch­es.”

“Un­til to-​night then,” said Randy, and opened the gate for her.

“Un­til to-​night,” she watched them and waved her hand as they drove off.

“A beau­ti­ful child,” the Ma­jor re­marked from the shad­ow of the back seat.

“She's more than beau­ti­ful,” said Randy, glow­ing, “oh, you wait till you re­al­ly know her, Ma­jor.”

V

The School­house at King's Crest had been built years be­fore by one of the Paines for two sons and their tu­tor. It was sep­arat­ed from the old brick man­sion by a wide ex­panse of un­mowed lawn, thick now in mid­sum­mer with flut­ter­ing pop­pies. There was a flagged stone walk, and an or­chard at the left, be­yond the or­chard were rolling fields, and in the dis­tance one caught a glimpse of the shin­ing riv­er.

On the low­er floor of the School­house were two am­ple sit­ting-​rooms with bed­rooms above, one of which was reached by out­side stairs, and the oth­er by an en­closed stair­way. Baths had been added when Mrs. Paine had come as a wid­ow to King's Crest with her small son, and had cho­sen the School­house as a qui­et haven. Lat­er, on the death of his grand­par­ents, Randy had in­her­it­ed the es­tate, and he and his moth­er had moved in­to the man­sion. But he had kept his rooms in the School­house, and was glad to know that he could go back to them.

Ma­jor Prime had the west sit­ting-​room. It was lined with low book­cas­es, full of old, old books. There was a fire­place, a winged chair, a broad couch, a big desk of dark sea­soned ma­hogany, and over the man­tel a steel en­grav­ing of Robert E. Lee. The low win­dows at the back looked out up­on the wood­ed green of the as­cend­ing hill; at the front was a porch which gave a view of the val­ley.

Ran­dolph's ar­rival had had some­thing of the ef­fect of a tri­umphal en­try. Jef­fer­son had driv­en him straight to the School­house, but on the way they had en­coun­tered old Susie, Jef­fer­son's moth­er, who cooked, and old Bob, who act­ed as but­ler, and the new maid who wait­ed on the ta­ble. These had fol­lowed the sur­rey as a sort of ec­stat­ic con­voy. Not a board­er was in sight but be­hind the win­dows of the big house one was aware of watch­ing eyes.

“They are all crazy to meet you,” Randy's moth­er had told him, as they came in­to the Ma­jor's sit­ting-​room af­ter those first sa­cred mo­ments when the doors had been shut against the world, “they are all crazy to meet you, but you needn't come over to lunch un­less you re­al­ly care to do it. Jef­fer­son can serve you here.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“My dear, I'm so proud of you, I'd like to show you to the whole world.”

“But there are so many of us, Moth­er.”

“There's on­ly one of you----”

“And we haven't come back to be put on pedestals.”

“You were put on pedestals be­fore you went away.”

“I'll be spoiled if you talk to me like that.”

“I shall talk as I please, Randy. Ma­jor Prime, isn't he as hand­some as a--rose?”

“_Moth­er_----”

“Well, you are----”

“Moth­er, if you talk like this to the board­ers, I'll go back and get shot up----”

She clung to him. “Randy, don't say such a thing. He mustn't talk like that, must he, Ma­jor?”

“He doesn't mean it. Paine, this looks to me like the Promised Land----”

“I'm glad you like it,” said Mrs. Paine, “and now if you don't mind, I'll run along and kill the fat­ted calf----”

She kissed her son, and un­der a huge um­brel­la made her way through the pop­pies that starred the grass----

“_On Flan­ders field--where pop­pies blow_”--the Ma­jor drew a sud­den quick breath---- He wished there were no pop­pies at King's Crest.

“I hate this hero stuff,” Randy was say­ing, “don't you?”

“I am not so sure that I do. Down deep we'd re­sent it if we were not ap­plaud­ed, shouldn't we?”

Randy laughed. “I be­lieve we should.”

“I fan­cy that when we've been home for a time, we may feel some­what bit­ter if we find that our pedestals are knocked from un­der us. Our peo­ple don't wor­ship long. They have too much to think of. They'll put up some arch­es, and a few stat­ues and build trib­ute hous­es in a lot of towns, and then they'll go on about their busi­ness, and we who have fought will feel a bit blank.”

Randy laughed, “You haven't any il­lu­sions about it, have you?”

“No, but you and I know that it's all right how­ev­er it goes.”

Randy, stand­ing very straight, looked out over the val­ley where the riv­er showed through the rain like a sil­ver thread. “Well, we didn't do it for praise, did we?”

“No, thank God.”

Their eyes were see­ing oth­er things than these qui­et hills. Things they want­ed to for­get. But they did not want to for­get the high ex­al­ta­tion which had sent them over, or the qui­et con­vic­tion of right which had helped them to car­ry on. What the peo­ple at home might do or think did not mat­ter. What mat­tered was their own ad­just­ment to the things which were to fol­low.

Randy went up-​stairs, took off his uni­form, bathed and came down in the gar­ments of peace.

“Glad to get out of your uni­form?” the Ma­jor asked.

“I be­lieve I am. Per­haps if I'd been an of­fi­cer, I shouldn't.”

“Ev­ery­body couldn't be. I've no doubt you de­served it.”

“I could have pulled wires, of course, be­fore I went over, but I wouldn't.”

From some­where with­in the big house came the re­ver­ber­ation of a Japanese gong.

Randy rose. “I'm go­ing over to lunch. I'd rather face guns, but Moth­er will like it. You can have yours here.”

“Not if I know it,” the Ma­jor rose, “I'm go­ing to share the fat­ted calf.”

VI

It was late that night when the Ma­jor went to bed. The feast in Randy's hon­or had last­ed un­til ten. There had been the shine of can­dles, and the laugh­ter of the wom­en, the old Judge's ge­nial hu­mor. Through the win­dows had come the fra­grance of hon­ey­suck­le and of late ros­es. Becky had sung for them, stand­ing be­tween two straight white can­dles.

“In the beau­ty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea, With the glo­ry in his bo­som which trans­fig­ures you and me. As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free While God is march­ing on----”

The last time the Ma­jor had heard a wom­an sing that song had been in a lit­tle French town just af­ter the Unit­ed States had gone in­to the war. She was of his own coun­try, red-​haired and in uni­form. She had stood on the steps of a stone house and weary men had clus­tered about her--French, En­glish, Scotch, a few Amer­icans. Tired and spent, they had gazed up at her as if they drank her in. To them she was more than a singing wom­an. She was the daugh­ter of a na­tion of dream­ers, _the daugh­ter of a na­tion which made its dreams come true_! Be­hind her stood a stead­fast peo­ple, and--God was march­ing on----!

He had had his leg then, and af­ter that there had been dread­ful fight­ing, and some­times in the midst of it the voice of the singing wom­an had come back to him, stiff­en­ing him to his task.

And here, miles away from that war-​swept land, an­oth­er wom­an sang. And there was hon­ey­suck­le out­side, and late ros­es--and pop­pies, and there was Peace. And the world which had not fought would for­get. But the men who had fought would re­mem­ber.

He heard Randy's voice, sharp with nerves. “Sing some­thing else, Becky. We've had enough of war----”

The Ma­jor leaned across the ta­ble. “When did you last hear that song, Paine?”

“On the oth­er side, a red-​haired wom­an--whose lover had been killed. I nev­er want to hear it again----”

“Nor I----”

It was as if they were alone at the ta­ble, see­ing the things which they had left be­hind. What did these peo­ple know who had stayed at home? The words were sa­cred--not to be sung; to be whis­pered--over the graves of--France.