St. Anthony's Hospital,
London

December 5th.

Mrs. James Gordon,

Dear Madam: No doubt you are wondering what I can have to say to you, as we are strangers to each other, so perhaps the best way for me to begin is by explaining just how I came to write.

I may say that I am a Corporal in the Ninth Lancashire regiment of foot, and, up to my being wounded and sent home from France last week, I have fought at a point where our lines touch with #/ the French and Americans. I would tell you the exact spot, but this is not allowed. There was an advance made here a short time ago, in which we reënforced them, resulting in the capture of a French village which the Germans had fortified with no end of care. It appears that some aviator managed to send back news of their new line by carrier pigeon, and this information helped us considerably. Anyway, we occupied the place, and, to make it short, I was stopped with a bullet in my leg just before the Germans fell back.

In the house where some women of the village helped the doctors care for the wounded, I was nursed by a woman who spoke English almost as well as anybody. She was German, she said, but in spite of that she was a good sort, and she sat all night with me when I was pretty near wild with a broken knee.

Next day but one I was recommended to be sent home, but before I left the village she asked me to do something for her as soon as I got back to England. Of course I was glad to pay for some of her kindness, if I could. She asked me to write to America, to Mrs. James Gordon, whose name and address she gave me on a paper, and tell her that her son was alive and not wounded, but a prisoner in Germany.

Being willing to do a good turn for a friend, and ally, as well as to pay the German woman for her care of me, I am writing at first opportunity. That is as much as I can remember that she said, for I was feeling too badly to think much, except to wonder at her, a German, asking me this. So hoping you will excuse the liberty, and with best wishes, I remain,

Yours truly,

John Enright,
Corporal Ninth Lancashires,
By Nurse Everitt.

Lucy did not read the last sentences of the kindly Englishman's letter. Warm tears were pouring down her cheeks, tears of relief and thankfulness, that, however hard the burden left to bear, they knew that Bob's life was spared. She repeated Elizabeth's name with wondering gratitude, for Elizabeth it must have been who had given the soldier such a charge. For a moment joy was the only feeling in her heart, and the thought of German imprisonment did not bring the fear and dread that came afterward.

There was only quiet rejoicing in the Gordon household, for Bob's fate seemed yet darkly uncertain, but hope there was plentiful room for, and with it came returning strength and courage to face the inevitable.

Mrs. Gordon could not wait to write her gratitude to the British soldier, who even in the midst of his own suffering had not failed to do a kindness. To Elizabeth she could only speak her thanks unheard, for the faithful affection which had given back at last far more than she owed her mistress for years of happy companionship. The extent of her debt to Elizabeth, Mrs. Gordon did not know, but for as much as she did, it was hard indeed not to be able to make an acknowledgment.

That afternoon when William was sitting on his mother's lap, listening with wide-eyed astonishment to her story of his brother, Mrs. Gordon turned a little anxiously at sight of Marian, who had come to her side to bring back the wonderful letter over which she had in turn been poring.

"Marian," she said, "I don't think we've taken very good care of you lately. I am afraid you must feel we haven't thought much about you." She searched her little cousin's face with self-reproachful eyes, but found it, to her relief, well and rosy.

Marian laughed, and sitting down on the arm of Mrs. Gordon's chair, gave her an affectionate kiss. "You needn't worry about me, Cousin Sally. I don't need half the looking after I used to. Anyway, Father will be along some day soon."

Mrs. Gordon looked thoughtfully at Marian, as she had not looked at her in the past two weeks, feeling a touch of pleasure in the midst of her heavy anxiety. Marian's dress had been carefully let out across the shoulders, but even now it was none too big for her. The look of discontent and indecision had left her face. Her once pale cheeks had a warm color, and her smiling lips had lost their babyish suggestion of a pout. She had tied back her hair well out of the way before school, and her manner, though diffident still and far from boisterous, had caught more than a little of Lucy's alertness and energy. Her prettiness had changed its pathetic wistfulness for a wide-awake look far more attractive, and Mrs. Gordon saw plainly now that the friendship between Marian and Lucy, at which she had sometimes wondered a little, was very likely to endure.

Lucy was up-stairs talking to Marie, who was putting William's room in order. Both Margaret and Marie, in spite of their never having seen Bob, had shown a warm-hearted sympathy with the Gordons' trouble. But Marie had a far greater understanding of it, having known what the war meant by actual experience, and Lucy had found her one day standing in front of Bob's picture in the sitting-room, with a sad look in her serious, dark eyes. Marie had helped wonderfully during those hard days. She had kept William happy and occupied when nobody else had spirits enough to play with him, and had done a hundred little things without being told, which took away the burden of them from her mistress' shoulders. Lucy had lost no time in telling her of the good news in the soldier's letter, confident that she would sincerely share in their rejoicing.