"No, with me," said Mr. Wakeham. "I will put up the fatted calf, for this my son is home again. Eh, my boy?"During the lunch hour try as they would they could not get away from the war. Dean was so completely obsessed with the subject that he could not divert his mind to anything else for any length of time.
"I cannot help it," he said at length. "All my switches run the same way."They had almost finished when Professor Schaefer came into the dining hall, spied them and hastened over to them.
"Here's this German beast," said Dean.
"Steady, Dean. We do business with him," said his father.
"All right, Father," replied the boy.
The Professor drew in a chair and sat down. He only wanted a light lunch and if they would allow him he would break in just where they were. He was full of excitement over the German successes on sea and on land.
"On land?" said Raeder. "Well, I should not radiate too freely about their land successes. What about the Marne?""The Marne!" said Schaefer in hot contempt. "The Marne--strategy--strategy, my dear sir. But wait. Wait a few days. If we could only get that boasted British navy to venture out from their holes, then the war would be over. Mark what happens in the Pacific.
Scientific gunnery, three salvos, two hundred minutes from the first gun. It is all over. Two British ships sunk to the bottom.
That is the German way. They would force war upon Germany. Now they have it. In spite of all the Kaiser's peace efforts, they drove Germany into the war.""The Kaiser!" exclaimed Larry, unable any longer to contain his fury. "The Kaiser's peace efforts! The only efforts that the Kaiser has made for the last few years are efforts to bully Europe into submission to his will. The great peace-maker of Europe of this and of the last century was not the Kaiser, but King Edward VII. All the world knows that.""King Edward VII!" sputtered Schaefer in a fury of contempt. "King Edward VII a peacemaker! A ----!" calling him a vile name. "And his son is like him!"The foul word was like a flame to powder with Larry. His hand closed upon his glass of water. "You are a liar," he said, leaning over and thrusting his face close up to the German. "You are a slanderous liar." He flung his glass of water full into Schaefer's face, sprang quickly to his feet, and as the German rose, swung with his open hand and struck hard upon the German's face, first on one cheek and then on the other.
With a roar Schaefer flung himself at him, but Larry in a cold fury was waiting for him. With a stiff, full-armed blow, which carried the whole weight of his body, he caught him on the chin. The professor was lifted clear over his chair. Crashing back upon the floor, he lay there still.
"Good boy, Larry," shouted Dean. "Great God! You did something that time."Silent, white, cold, rigid, Larry stood waiting. More than any of them he was amazed at what he had done. Some friends of the Professor rushed toward them.
"Stand clear, gentlemen," said Raeder. "We are perfectly able to handle this. This man offered my friend a deadly insult. My friend simply anticipated what I myself would gladly have done.
Let me say this to you, gentlemen, for some time he and those of his kind have made themselves offensive. Every man is entitled to his opinion, but I have made up my mind that if any German insults my friends the Allies in my presence, I shall treat him as this man has been treated."There was no more of it. Schaefer's friends after reviving him led him off. As they passed out of the dining hall Larry and his friends were held up by a score or more of men who crowded around him with warm thanks and congratulations. The affair was kept out of the press, but the news of it spread to the limits of clubland.
The following day Raeder thought it best that they should lunch again together at the University Club. The great dining-room was full. As Raeder and his company entered there was first a silence, then a quick hum of voices, and finally applause, which grew in volume till it broke into a ringing cheer. There was no longer any doubt as to where the sympathy of the men of the University Club, at least, lay in this world conflict.
Two days later a telegram was placed upon Larry's desk. Opening it, he read, "Word just received Jack Romayne killed in action."Larry carried the telegram quietly into the inner office and laid it upon his chief's desk.
"I can stand this no longer, sir," he said in a quiet voice. "Iwish you to release me. I must return to Canada. I am going to the war.""Very well, my boy," said Mr. Wakeham. "I know you have thought it over. I feel you could not do otherwise. I, too, have been thinking, and I wish to say that your place will await you here and your salary will go on so long as you are at the war. No! not a word! There is not much we Americans can do as yet, but I shall count it a privilege as an American sympathising with the Allies in their great cause to do this much at least. And you need not worry about that coal mine. Dean has been telling me about it. We will see it through."
