And, indeed, it seemed true. As the car rolled slowly through the village, children ran beside the wheels, women waved their hands from the doorways of the little cottages, and wounded poilus saluted the passage of the Red Cross worker who was known and beloved by everybody.
The tears stung Ruth’s eyelids. She remembered how, the night before, the patients in the convalescent wards—the boys and men she had written letters for before her injury, and whom she had tried to comfort in other ways during the hours she was off duty—had insisted upon coming to her cell, one by one, to bid her good-bye. They had kissed her hands, those brave, grateful fellows! Their gratitude had spilled over in tears, for the Frenchman is never ashamed of emotion.
As she had come down from her chamber every nurse and orderly in the hospital, as well as the surgical staff and even the porters and brancardiers, had gathered to bid her God-speed.
“The dear, dear people!” Ruth murmured, as the car reached the end of the village street. She turned to throw kisses with her one useful hand to the crowd gathered in the street.
“The dear, dear people!” she repeated, smiling through her happy tears at Hetty.
“Ah, they know you, Mademoiselle,” said the girl with a practical nod. “And they know they will seldom see your like again.”
“Oh, la, la!” responded Ruth, using an expression of Henriette’s, and laughed. Then suddenly: “You are not taking the shortest road, Henriette Dupay!”
“What! do you expect to get away from Clair without seeing Madame the Countess?” laughed the younger girl. “I would not so dare—no, no! I have promised to take you past the château. And at the corner of the road beyond my whole family will await you. Papa Dupay has declared a holiday on the farm till we go past.”
Ruth was really very happy, despite the fact that she was leaving these friends. It made for happiness, the thought that everybody about Clair wished her well.
The car mounted the gentle slope of the highway that passed the château gates. It was a beautiful road with great trees over-arching it—trees that had sprung from the soil at least two hundred years before. With all the air raids there had been about Clair, the Hun had not worked his wrath upon this old forest, nor upon the château almost hidden behind the high wall.