With their arms about each other they knelt, mingling tears and sobs together till their strength was done. Then through the sobs the boy heard her voice. "You gave him to me," he heard her whisper, not in her ordinary manner of reverent formal prayer, but as if remonstrating with a friend. "You know you gave him to me and I gave him back.--I know he is not mine.--But won't you let me have him for a little while?--It will not be so very long.--Yes, yes, I know.--I am not holding him back.--No, no, I could not, Iwould not do that.--Oh, I would not.--What am I better than the others?--But you will give him back to me again.--There are so many never coming back, and I have only one boy.--You will let him come back.--He is my baby boy.--It is his mother asking."Larry could bear it no longer. "Oh, mother, mother, mother," he cried. "You are breaking my heart. You are breaking my heart."His sobs were shaking the bed on which he leaned.
His mother lifted her head. "What is it, Lawrence, my boy?" she asked in surprise. "What is it?" Her voice was calm and steady.
"We must be steadfast, my boy. We must not grudge our offering.
No, with willing hearts we must bring our sacrifice." She passed into prayer. "Thou, who didst give Thy Son, Thine only Son, to save Thy world, aid me to give mine to save our world to-day. Let the vision of the Cross make us both strong. Thou Cross-bearer, help us to bear our cross." With a voice that never faltered, she poured forth her prayer of sacrifice, of thanksgiving, of supplication, till serene, steady, triumphant, they arose from their knees. She was heard "in that she feared," in her surrender she found victory, in her cross, peace. And that serene calm of hers remained undisturbed to the very last.
There were tears again at the parting, but the tears fell gently, and through them shone ever her smile.
A few short days Larry spent at his home moving about among those that were dearer to him than his own life, wondering the while at their courage and patience and power to sacrifice. In his father he seemed to discover a new man, so concentrated was he in his devotion to business, and so wise, his only regret being that he could not don the king's uniform. With Kathleen he spent many hours. Not once throughout all these days did she falter in her steady, calm endurance, and in her patient devotion to duty.
Without tears, without a word of repining against her cruel fate, with hardly a suggestion, indeed, of her irreparable loss, she talked to him of her husband and of his glorious death.
After two months an unexpected order called the battalion on twenty-four hours' notice for immediate service over seas, and amid the cheers of hundreds of their friends and fellow citizens, although women being in the majority, the cheering was not of the best, they steamed out of Melville Station. There were tears and faces white with heartache, but these only after the last cheer had been flung upon the empty siding out of which the cars of the troop-train had passed. The tears and the white faces are for that immortal and glorious Army of the Base, whose finer courage and more heroic endurance make victory possible to the army of the Fighting First Line.
At Winnipeg the train was halted for a day and a night, where the battalion ENJOYED the hospitality of the city which never tires of welcoming and speeding on the various contingents of citizen soldiers of the West en route for the Front. There was a dinner and entertainment for the men. For Larry, because he was Acting Adjutant, there was no respite from duty through all the afternoon until the men had been safely disposed in the care of those who were to act as their hosts at dinner. Then the Colonel took him off to Jane and her father, who were waiting with their car to take them home.
"My! but you do look fine in your uniform," said Jane, "and so strong, and so big; you have actually grown taller, I believe."Her eyes were fairly standing out with pride and joy.
"Not much difference north and south," said Larry, "but east and west, considerable. And you, Jane, you are looking better than ever. Whatever has happened to you?""Hard work," said Jane.
"I hear you are in the Big Business up to your neck," said Larry.
"There is so much to do, I can well believe it. And so your father is going? How splendid of him!""Oh, every one is doing what he can do best. Father will do the ambulance well.""And I hear you are going too."
"I do not know about that," said Jane. "Isn't it awfully hard to tell just what to do? I should love to go, but that is the very reason I wonder whether I should. There is so much to do here, and there will be more and more as we go on, so many families to look after, so much work to keep going; work for soldiers, you know, and for their wives and children, and collecting money. And it is all so easy to do, for every one is eager to do what he can. I never knew people could be so splendid, Larry, and especially those who have lost some one. There is Mrs. Smart, for instance, and poor Scallan's mother, and Scuddy's.""Jane," said Larry abruptly, "I must see Helen. Can we go at once when we take the others home?""I will take you," said Jane. "I am glad you can go. Oh, she is lovely, and so sweet, and so brave."Leaving the Colonel in Dr. Brown's care, they drove to the home of Helen Brookes.
"I dread seeing her," said Larry, as they approached the house.
"Well, you need not dread that," said Jane.
And after one look at Helen's face Larry knew that Jane was right.
The bright colour in the face, the proud carriage of the head, the saucy look in the eye, once so characteristic of the "beauty queen"of the 'Varsity, were all gone. But the face was no less beautiful, the head carried no less proudly, the eye no less bright. There was no shrinking in her conversation from the tragic fact of her lover's death. She spoke quite freely of Scuddy's work in the battalion, of his place with the men and of how they loved him, and all with a fine, high pride in him.
