“I’ve got some business with you,” Kendall said, “as soon as we can get Miss Ware settled.”
“What do you want? What do you need?...” This to Maude: “I’ll give you details of men till the cows come home. Just ask for it, and—if it’s in this sector—we’ll get it for you.... By Jove!... Think of it! Going to stay!... Oh, say!”
Maude laughed. “You’ll have me thinking I’m doing something unusual in a minute.”
“Unusual! Miss Knox, if you knew what it will mean to these boys to have an American girl here—just to know she’s around! It’s wonderful, that’s what it is! Do you realize that some of the men haven’t seen an American woman in a year—haven’t talked to a woman?... By Jove!...” Every time he thought about it he became boyishly inarticulate again.
“They’re fixing up my canteen for me,” she said.
“Good! I’ll run up and see they do it right.”
“I—I wouldn’t, if I were you,” said Maude, gently. “They seem to like it—to want to do it themselves. They shooed me away. Don’t you think it would be better to let them go ahead by themselves—if it pleases them?”
Kendall was conscious of a pride in her, in her understanding and her beautiful tact. So was Captain Morris, who could only stare at her unbelievingly and utter, “By Jove!...”
In half an hour they three walked back to the canteen.
“Here she comes!” yelled a boy in the door, and a sergeant with a smudge on his nose, his sleeves rolled up, and a hammer in his hand, poked his nose out of the door.