'But you said you promised dad to pay us another visit as soon as you could,' her letter concluded, 'and I am writing to remind you of your promise. You told me you had some leave still due to you after your last visit, so why not come at once? The sooner the better.'
She gave no special reason for asking me to come, but I read into her appeal a desire to tell me something, and perhaps to ask my advice. I therefore had a chat with my C.O., with the result that I started to see my friend the same day.
On arriving at the station I found him on the platform awaiting me.
'Now this is sensible,' he cried with a laugh. 'This is something like dispatch. Come on, I have a motor outside. I suppose you will trust me to drive you.'
'You look fit, anyhow,' I said.
'Fit as a fiddle,' he replied. 'I go back to the front in four days.'
He looked years younger than when I had first seen him. The old wistful look in his eyes had almost entirely gone, while the parchment-like skin had become almost as smooth and ruddy as that of a boy.
'Oh, it has been glorious,' he said. 'I've taken the little mother to all sorts of places, and dad declares she looks twenty years younger. More than once we've been taken for lovers.'
'And your memory, Jack?'
'Sound as a bell. Wonderful, isn't it? Sometimes I'm almost glad I went through it all. After—after—years of darkness and loneliness, to emerge suddenly into the light! To have a mother, and a father, and—a home!'