GI Brides (61 page)

“Why, right away,” said Dale joyously, with a lilt in her tone. “The sooner the better.”

“That’s perfect,” said David. “We’ll hunt up a license tomorrow. How long do you have to wait to get a license in this state?”

“Why, I really don’t know, but what matters a little bit of time like a day or two? You are here now, and all time will go fast. But I’d like the cousins to be here.”

“Of course,” said David. “They’re rare! I’m glad they are nearby. But oh, my darling! To think I have you in my arms at last! It seems too good to be true.” He drew her close again and touched his lips to her eyelids. “My precious!” he said. “What did I tell you, ‘Joy cometh in the morning’? This is our morning.”

Dale smiled softly and then added in a low tone, “And my Savior kept you safely all through the night.”

A
tall young soldier swung off the bus at its terminal and walked briskly up Wolverton Drive.

He was a handsome soldier, though he did not seem at all conscious of it. He had strong, well-chiseled features, heavy dark hair, and fine eyes. He walked with a kind of grave assurance, as if this was something he had fully made up his mind to do, though not as if this broad avenue were an old haunt of his; more as if he were driving himself to a sacred duty.

Oh, it wasn’t the first time he had walked that way, of course. In his school days he had passed up that road, had carefully studied its substantial houses, admired them each, and later come to search out and be interested in one particular house. He had never stepped within one of them, for his life had not been blessed with wealth and luxury, but he had admired a girl in school who lived here, and he had taken pains to find out where she lived. Not that he had a personal acquaintance with that little girl in the grade school. Oh no! They had been only children then, with but the passing acquaintance of classmates as the years progressed. But he had been interested enough to find out where she lived, and when he had found her house he had been glad, as his eyes took in the lines of the fine old stone mansion. There had been no envy in his glance. He was glad she had a background like that. It was satisfying to know it. It seemed to finish out the picture for him. But he had known then, and equally he knew now, that
he
did not belong in this setting. He even knew that the circumstance that had brought him here now might not be recognized by anyone belonging to her as justifying his coming. Nevertheless, he had come, and having started he was not to be turned back now at the last minute by any qualms of reason or conscience that might have made him hesitate in the past.

At the third corner the soldier turned sharply into a broad driveway sweeping up in a pleasant curve to the old gray stone house that gave evidence of having been built a goodly number of years before.

As if he were accustomed to treading this way, he walked quickly without hesitation, mounted the stone steps, and passed within a stone arch.

As he stood awaiting an answer to his ring, he cast a quick comprehensive glance up and down the broad veranda, with a look in his eyes as if the quiet elegance of the place was pleasant to him. There was satisfaction in his expression.

As he stood there he looked as if he might fit into that setting very easily. There was courtesy, strength, grace in his whole bearing, and the elderly servant who opened the door did not seem to see anything incongruous in his being there. These were days when men of the army and navy were honored guests everywhere. Moreover, his attitude and manner showed the culture of one to the manner born.

“I would like to see Miss Blythe Bonniwell,” he said, stepping into the hall as the servant swung the door wide and indicated a small reception room where he might sit down.

“She’s still in,” said the woman. “She’s gone up to get ready to go to her Red Cross meeting.”

“I’ll not keep her long,” promised the soldier understandingly.

“Who shall I say is here?” asked the woman.

The young man turned on her a winning grin.

“Why, you can tell her it is Charlie Montgomery. I’m not sure she’ll remember the name. It’s been some time. Just tell her I’m an old schoolmate and I’d like to see her about something rather important. That is, if she can spare just a minute or two.”

“
Mr.
Montgomery, did you say?” asked the woman with dignity.

“Yes, I suppose you might call it Mr. But I doubt if she would identify me that way,” said the soldier with a grin. “It wasn’t the way I was known, but it’s all right with me if she remembers.”

“Just sit down,” said the woman, with a disapproving air. “I’ll call her. She’ll likely be down in a short time.”

The young man entered the room indicated and sat down in the first chair that presented itself, dropping his face in his hands for an instant and drawing a quick breath almost like a petition. Then he straightened up, but he did not look about him. This was her home, her natural environment, that for long years he had often wished he might see, but he did not wish his mind to be distracted now. He must be alert and at attention when she came. This was probably a crazy thing he was doing, and yet he felt somehow he had to do it.

He heard a light step, and glancing up he saw her coming down the wide staircase that he could just glimpse through the open doorway. She seemed so like the little girl she had been long ago. The same light movement, as if her feet had wings, the same curly brown hair with golden lights in it, the same ease and poise and grace of movement.

She was wearing a slim brown dress that matched the lovely brown of her eyes, and there was a bright knot of ribbons in her brown hair, green and scarlet, that looked like berries and a leaf. It was like a jewel in a picture. His heart quickened as she came, and he felt abashed again at the errand that had brought him here.

She entered the room eagerly, and an interested smile dawned on her sweet face.

The soldier rose and stood awaiting her. A salute—
that
was her due, yet he didn’t want to flaunt his position as a soldier. But she was putting out her hand, both hands, as if she had a warm welcome for him. It occurred to him that perhaps she did not remember him—had possibly taken him for someone else. Or was it her habit to welcome all soldiers in this war-hearted gracious way? But no, she just wasn’t that free kind of a girl. She was welcoming him as someone she knew intimately and was glad to see.

The look in her eyes, the warm touch of her hand, seemed so genuine that his own plans for distant courtesy seemed somehow out of place. And so for a moment he could only stand there with her hands in his and look down at her as she spoke.

“I’m so glad to see you!” she said. “It’s a long time since we met.”

“You remember me?” he asked in wonder. “You know who I am?”

“Why, of course!” said the girl, with a happy little lilt in the turn of her voice. “You’re the boy who sat in the very last seat in the first row in our senior high school year. You’re the one who always knew all the answers all the way through our school years. Because you really studied, and you cared to know.”

He looked at her in astonishment.

“Did I seem like that to you?”

“Oh yes,” she said, drawing a happy little breath. “You seemed to be the one student in our room who really cared. I wondered whatever became of you. Did you go away to college, or go to work, or what?”

“Oh, I went to college,” he said modestly, not even showing by so much as a glint in his eyes what a march of hard work and triumph that college course had been. This young man was one who took the next thing in his stride and did his best in it as he went.

“And now you’re in the army,” she said, her glance taking in the insignia on his uniform. “You’re—?” She paused and gave him a troubled look. “You’re going overseas pretty soon?”

“Yes,” he said, coming back to his purpose. “Yes, if it hadn’t been for that, I would scarcely have ventured to come to see you.”

“And why not, I’d like to know?” asked the girl, lifting her lovely eyes and bringing into her face all the old interest she had had in this fellow-student who had been so much of a stranger to her, bringing a light of genuine understanding and admiration.

“Why not?” He laughed. “Why, I had no acquaintance with you. You belonged in a different class.”

“Oh no,” said the girl, with a twinkle in her eyes, nestling her hands in the big strong ones that still held hers. “Have you forgotten? You were in my class all through school. And what’s more, you were the very
head
of the class. It was my main ambition to try and keep up with you in my studies. I knew I ever could get ahead, but I wanted to be at least second in the class! So don’t say again that you weren’t in my class.”

He laughed, with an appreciation of the way she had turned the meaning of his words, and the fine color rolled up into his face gorgeously.

“You know I didn’t mean that,” he protested. “I knew you were the lovely lady of the class, and that you gave me a wholesome race as far as studies were concerned. But even so, that didn’t put me into your class. You, with your lovely home, and your noble father and mother, and your aristocratic birth, and your millions, and your fashionable friends.”

“Oh,” said the girl, with almost contempt in her voice, “and what are they to separate people? Why should just
things
like that have made us almost strangers, when we could have been such good friends?”

He looked at her with a deep reverence.

“If I had known you felt that way, perhaps it wouldn’t have taken me so long to decide whether I ought to come to you today.”

“Oh, I am so glad you came!” she said impulsively. “But come, let’s sit down!” Blythe, suddenly aware that her hands were still being held closely, flashed a rosy light into her cheeks as she drew the young man over toward the couch and made him sit down beside her.

“Now,” she said, “tell me all about it. You came for some special reason, something you had to tell me, Susan said when she announced you.”

“Yes,” said the soldier, suddenly reverting to his first shyness and to the realization of his appalling impertinence in what he had to say. “Yes, I have something special to tell you. I know I’m presuming in speaking of it, and perhaps you will think me crazy for daring to tell you. I’m sure I never would have dared to come if it hadn’t been that I’m in the army and that I have volunteered to undertake a very special and dangerous commission about which I am not allowed to speak. It is enough to say that it means almost certain death for me. And that’s all right with me. I went into it with this knowledge, and it’s little enough to do for my country. But when I came to look the fact in the face and get ready for my departure, which is probably to be tonight, I found there was something I wanted to do before I go. There was just one person to whom I wanted to say good-bye. And that was you. I have nobody else. My mother has been gone two years. She was all I had. My other relatives, the few that are left, live far away and do not care anyway. But there was just one person whom I wanted to see before I left, and that was you. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Mind?” said Blythe, lifting dewy eyes to his. “I think that is wonderful! Why should I mind?”

“But we are practically strangers, you know,” he said with hesitation. “And in the ordinary run of life, if there were no war and things were going normally, we would probably never have been anything but strangers. I am not likely ever to become one whom your family would welcome as one of your friends—”

“Oh, but you don’t understand my family,” said the girl, putting out an impulsive hand to touch his arm. “My family is not like that. They are not a lot of snobs!” She was speaking with intense fervor, and her eyes implored him to believe.

“Oh no,” he said, “I would not call anything that belonged to you by such a name. I don’t want you to think that, please! It was never even in my thoughts. I have only thought of them as being fine, upstanding, conservative people, with a high regard for the formalities of life. It would not be natural for them to pick out a ‘poor boy’ as a friend for their cherished daughter. But I thought, since this is probably the last time that I may be seeing you on this earth, it would do no harm for me to tell you what you have always been to me. You have been an inspiration to me from even my little boyhood when I first saw you in school, and I have loved to watch you. And in my thoughts I have always honored you. I felt as if I would like to tell you that, before I go. I hope it will not annoy you to be told, and that you will remember me as a friend who deeply admired—and—yes,
loved
you from afar, and who for a long time has prayed for you every night. Will you forgive me for saying these things?”

Impulsively he put out his hands, laid them upon hers again, and looked at her with pleading eyes. But her own eyes were so filled with sudden tears that she could not see the look in his.

“
Forgive!
” she said in a small, choking voice. “Why, there is nothing to forgive. It seems very wonderful to me that you should say these things, that you should have felt this way. And of all the beautiful thoughts, that you should
pray
for me! Why, I never knew you even noticed me. And I’m glad,
glad,
now, that you have told me! It seems the loveliest thing that ever came into my life. But oh,
why
do you have to go away?
When
do you have to go?”

He gave a quick glance down at his wristwatch and said with distress in his voice, “I ought to be on my way now. I have things to do before I take the noon train. I waited on purpose until the last minute, that I might not be tempted to stay too long and annoy you.”

He sprang to his feet, but her hands clung to his and she rose with him.

“Oh, but I can’t let you go like this,” she pleaded, her eyes looking deep into his, her face lifted with the bright tears on her cheeks. “I
can’t
let you go. You have just told me that you love me, and we must have a little time to get acquainted before you go. I—oh—I think I must have been loving you, too, all this time.” Her own glance dropped shyly. “There was no one else ever who seemed to me as wonderful as you were, even when I was a little girl. Please don’t go yet.
We must
have more time to get our hearts acquainted.”