“But certainly! the firing has almost ceased,” was the willing answer. “We shall have a quiet night, so it appears. I will stay here on guard until you return.”
“Lucy, don’t try to run again—you’ll kill yourself,” urged Bob, putting his arm about his little sister’s shoulders and giving her an involuntary hug. “Stay here, and I’ll be back as soon as possible. This man who told me where the hospital was will take me there.”
“I can run, Bob, but of course you can go faster alone,” said Lucy reluctantly, hating to lose her brother for any of these precious moments. “Go on—Father will love so to see you,” she added quickly. “And then you will know yourself that he is really getting well.”
Her words were hardly spoken when the heavy crashing boom of a cannon broke the quiet of the German lines. Other shots followed before the screaming shell had burst. At once from the wood in front of the meadows the French and American guns replied. The bursting German shells increased in number, and now once more a thunderous din reëchoed through the quivering air.
Speechless with despairing terror, Lucy threw her arms about Bob’s neck, and he held her while he shouted in her ear, “It’s on again—I can’t go now! Buck up there, Captain!”
The old name roused Lucy’s sinking courage. She stood erect and dazedly saw the little crowd around them fast dispersing, Captain Jourdin putting away the tools and picking up his helmet, and Miss Pearse running quickly to her side. She did not hear the words the nurse shouted, but she heard Captain Jourdin speaking hastily to Bob. “——to get back to the squadron before the fire grows hotter—no time to lose—we shall be needed if the German lines are stiffening before the town——” These fragments caught her ear. She understood, too, that Bob was in greater danger if he delayed, and that was enough to make her forget everything else. She put her arms about his neck again and said a brief good-bye, hoping the shake in her voice was drowned by the cannon.
The next moment Bob was seated in his plane, leaning down to her for a final leave-taking. A mechanic from the town stood ready by the propeller. Captain Jourdin was in his own machine, and now he turned to Lucy, raising his hand in a farewell gesture that seemed to speak his own dauntless courage. In another moment he was off down the meadow like a skimming bird. Bob’s last words were quickly spoken.
“Give lots of love to Father—and Cousin Henry. You’ll go back to England to-morrow?” he shouted. Lucy had not even had time to tell him Mr. Leslie was not there. He nodded to the man at the propeller, then turned to Lucy once more. “Do you know whom I saw in Château-Plessis a month ago—might—here—still!” The roaring propeller drowned his words.
“Bob—what?” begged Lucy, straining her ears as she leaped back from the machine, but Bob could not hear her either. She saw his lips move, though not a sound came from them. But he thought she understood and with a last nod and smile which he tried hard to make cheerful, for that lonely little figure standing there brought an aching pang to his heart, he pressed forward his control stick and sped off down the field.
Side by side Miss Pearse and Lucy watched the two Nieuports rise into the air over the wood, soaring far above the bursting shells. Then they turned and with one accord ran swiftly toward the town, while the thundering guns shook the earth beneath their feet.