“Donald, if he should ask me to call or anything, what should I do? If I have a previous date with you, it would only make him do something mean to you. I don’t believe I’ll go to the ice carnival at all.”
“If he should ask to call, I think you would be safe to let him do it, even if you don’t like him. I’m sure I can’t advise you, for I hate to think of your having anything to do with him. Don’t think of me. I can keep out of any more trouble, I think. Jim promised to warn me through one of the other boys if he knows of anything.”
“When did Captain Holley come to the military school, or do you know?”
“The year before Louise came here, for a little while, you know. I always wondered why she didn’t stay.”
“There was some trouble, and the girls did not regret her going. She made herself disagreeable enough. But the poor girl had all kinds of trouble, of course, for which she wasn’t to blame. She tries to be more friendly now.”
“When Holley tried to claim, one day in a group of us cadets, that his country didn’t start the war, and isn’t to blame and all that, I thought it was too funny to get mad about, and he kept saying that Americans ought to keep neutral—nothing to us, I suppose, how many of our people get killed at sea—but they have relatives over there, and maybe they really do think it. Our boys get pretty hot sometimes, and you ought to see how the drills have improved! Even the smallest of the kid cadets are getting ready to fight for their country! Holley claims that even if he had not been in the United States, the trouble with his eyes would have kept him out of the army.”
“The girls talk, too, though Miss Randolph and the teachers try to keep them from having arguments or stirring up Professor Schafer and Doctor Carver. Isabel came rushing into our suite the other day, with her cheeks hot and her eyes flashing, and asked us what we thought of the idea that you would do anything, no matter how mean, for your country, ‘your country right or wrong’ stuff. ‘Do you think that’s patriotism?’ she asked, about the way she does in debate. Cathalina told her that of course you would love your country and your flag, ‘right or wrong,’ but to ‘justify’ wrong acts of the people who were running the government certainly wouldn’t be true patriotism. She said that her mother said God’s laws were first, and that our motto says ‘In God we trust.’”
“Oh, well,” said Donald, “in our country we don’t hesitate to speak out and tell our politicians what we think. Our flag stands for certain principles—ideals, the old boy calls them, and it’s those that we’ll fight for if we get into the war. He made us a long speech the other day on patriotism, and took up all these puzzling things. He said that our flag stands for these great principles, and that sometimes there was a difference between our real government and its principles, and their administration by politicians that were not really patriots. I wish you had heard him. Such cheering and clapping! He’s the kind of an old scout to put in charge of a military academy! It wouldn’t be a very pleasant place to be in these days for anybody who wasn’t a good American.”
“Good!” exclaimed Betty. “But I do think it is the funniest thing to hear you and Jack and the rest of the boys call the commandant the ‘old boy’ and ‘old scout.’ He is so big and dignified. I should think you’d be afraid of him.”
“We are. But what good would he be if he weren’t strict? You don’t know how much good military discipline does some of those wild boys that come to our school. Though it is true, Miss Betty, that one can have too much of a good thing!”