“The censor has just got to pass that when I write home,” she announced.
Late that evening we made our port. On our way in we passed a British cruiser, coaling. The band was playing, as is usual during coaling. Our tall ship slid past in the dusk, undemonstratively, almost surreptitiously. One of the tragedies of modern warfare lies in its anonymity. You may not display your true colours or advertise your presence anywhere—even to your friends. So we crept past. But a sailor can read ships as a landsman reads books. The cruiser’s band stopped suddenly, right in the middle of a tune, and in two minutes the cruiser’s sides, rigging, and tops were crowded with half-naked, coal-grimed humanity yelling themselves hoarse to the roaring multitude on the liner.
“Listen!” shouted Boone Cruttenden into his companion’s ear, as a fresh burst of sound added itself to the tumult; “their band has struck up again. Can you hear it?”
“No! Yes, I do now. I guess it’s ‘God Save the King,’ or one of those tunes.”
But Miss Lane was wrong. Suddenly the cheering died away for a moment, and the band made itself heard, joyfully and triumphantly, for the first time.
And the tune it played was “Over There.”
“Oh, gee!” said Miss Lane, with a sob in her voice. “Oh, gee!”