All this is in the past, now. It seemed to Ruth Fielding, standing on the porch of the old farmhouse attached to the Red Mill and looking down the rutted highway, that many, many of her experiences during the months of war must have been dreams.
Even the injured shoulder troubled her no more. She was her old vigorous, cheerful self again. Yet there was a difference. There was a poise of mind and a seriousness about the girl of the Red Mill that would never again wear off. No soul that has been seared in any way by the awful flame of the Great War will ever recover from it. The scar must remain till death.
The war was well nigh over. Tom’s prophecy was to be fulfilled. The Hun, driven to madness by his own sins, could fight no more. The actual fighting might end any day. On a ship coming homeward were Helen and Jennie—the latter with a tall and handsome French colonel at her side, who had been given special leave of absence from the French Intelligence Department.
Ruth saw an automobile swing into the road a couple of miles away and grow larger and larger very rapidly as it rushed down toward her. She wound a chiffon veil about her head as she called back into the open doorway of the farmhouse kitchen:
“Tom is coming, Aunty. I sha’n’t be long away.”
“All right, my pretty! All right!” returned the voice of Aunt Alvirah, quite strong and cheerful again. “Oh, my back! and oh, my bones! All right!”
She hobbled to the door on her cane. Her apple-withered cheeks had a little color after all. The little old woman began to mend the moment she set eyes on “her pretty” again.
When the automobile pulled down at the gate for Ruth to step in beside the begoggled Tom and the engine was shut off, they could hear the grinding of the mill-stones. Times had improved. Uncle Jabez, as dusty and solemn of visage as ever, but with a springier step than was his wont, came to the door and waved a be-floured hand to them.
“All right, Ruthie?” asked Tom, smiling at her.