Peggy must be excused if she could not at first recollect. Though Crouch's heart was the same as ever and his was the same indomitable will, he bore more than one mark of the recent conflict: his clothes were in rags, his face was cut and bruised, and he had been drenched to the skin in the salt water of the sea.
"Forgive me," said Peggy; "but, I can't remember."
And then, she saw Crouch's strange glass eye that always stared in front of him, and remembered on a sudden.
"Why, yes!" she cried, holding out both hands. "Of course, I remember now."
A few quick questions from either side were answered no less briefly. The waters of remembrance--even of quite little things--are very sweet indeed; and it was pure joy to them to speak of the Admiral's lucky sixpence.
It was that that brought back Crouch's mind to Jimmy, whom a strange fate was bringing to the very hospital where he would be cared for by the best friend and sole companion of other far-off days.
The ship's officers and crew of the "Mondavia" came to this quiet haven of rest like broken men--men who had been broken upon the relentless wheel of war. Jimmy Burke was well able to walk; for all that, he was so bruised and aching in his limbs that he did so like an old man, limping painfully and leaning heavily upon a stick.
His surprise and amazement can better be imagined than described when, arrived at the hospital, he found himself confronted by Peggy Wade. It was, indeed, a strange thing that, in so short a space of time, and after so many vicissitudes and dangers, these two should be brought together again. All the way across the Atlantic--more especially when they were off the coast of Ireland and pursued by a German submarine--the girl's thoughts had been of Jimmy, the friend and companion from whom she had parted in New York. Two days after the boy had gone, she had been offered a post with an American hospital which was about to be established in the north of England, prior to leaving for the scene of operations in France. And three days after her arrival in England, a strange "chance" brought him--hurt, broken and weary--to the very hospital where the girl herself was employed.
Jimmy's case was not very different from that of the majority of his companions. Though he had sustained no serious bodily injury, he had passed through an ordeal that had been enough to shatter the nerves of the strongest men. Long hours of peril, followed by sleepless nights, during which the greatest hardships have to be endured, will sap the strength and vital energy no less surely than the most dangerous wounds. It was necessary for all these men to rest, to be given nourishing food and to be allowed to sleep. As for those who were wounded--like the two merchant captains, Cookson and the burly Whisker--they received skilful treatment and the tenderest care; so that, though more than one was brought to the hospital more dead than alive, not one succumbed to his injuries.
In two days' time, when Jimmy Burke was quite restored to health, though still sore, a party of three people travelled to London by train. And these three were Captain Crouch, Peggy Wade (who had obtained a few days' leave) and Jimmy Burke himself.