"And went to the aviation field?" Lucy's eyes were fixed so hard on her brother's face that he wanted to laugh as she went on with deliberate certainty, "I know—now. You went to fly. Why wouldn't you tell me?"
"Sh-h! I would have told you, but Dad thought Mother might worry about it," said Bob, smiling at Lucy's big, reproachful eyes and the little, worried frown between her brows. "There wasn't any danger, anyway, was there, Dad? They go up here every day, and there has been only one serious accident since the school commenced."
"Oh, Bob, wasn't it great?" cried Lucy, forgetting her fears in her own longings to share one of the many flights she had watched. "Were you in the one that flew over the harbor an hour ago?"
"I guess so. We were up at about that time. It didn't seem a minute that we were flying." Bob's face grew bright again at the thrilling remembrance, and he turned eagerly to his father. "How can any one say, Dad, that this war hasn't the chances for heroism that other wars had? When you can be an airman—well, you know what I mean,—you can do anything."
Major Gordon tapped his pencil thoughtfully against his palm. "If you have that particular kind of grit and steady endurance. Otherwise, you can serve your country much better on the ground."
"Dad, you're a regular wet-blanket," said Bob with a grin. "I guess I'd better make a good infantryman first,—is that it?"
Lucy had slipped her arm through Bob's and stood looking at him in anxious silence. Two days of leave were over, and it seemed such a little bit of a while remaining before Bob joined his regiment at Fort Totten. And that regiment, as everybody knew, was in fine trim and daily awaiting orders for the other side. Lucy scorned to wish Bob transferred to any other, but now she vaguely wondered whether a change to aviation would keep him longer from the battle-front, and what the difference in his life would be.
"Come on, Captain Lucy. Let's go find Mother," said Bob, rousing his sister with a soft tweak of her hair as she rubbed her head thoughtfully against his sleeve.
"Oh, I must go and tell Marian about the party. She must be awake," said Lucy, hearing footsteps on the floor above and feeling that a glimpse of her cousin's care-free prettiness might cheer her from her sudden gloom.