TISH DOES HER BIT
From the very beginning of the war Tish was determined to go to France. But she is a truthful woman, and her age kept her from being accepted. She refused, however, to believe that this was the reason, and blamed her rejection on Aggie and myself.
“Age fiddlesticks!” she said, knitting violently. “The plain truth is—and you might as well acknowledge it, Lizzie—that they would take me by myself quick enough, just to get the ambulance I’ve offered, if for no other reason. But they don’t want three middle-aged women, and I don’t know that I blame them.”
That was during September, I think, and Tish had just received her third rejection. They were willing enough to take the ambulance, but they would not let Tish drive it. I am quite sure it was September, for I remember that Aggie was having hay fever at the time, and she fell to sneezing violently.
Tish put down her knitting and stared at Aggie fixedly until the paroxysm was over.
“Exactly,” she observed, coldly. “Imagine me creeping out onto a battlefield to gather up the wounded, and Aggie crawling behind, going off like an alarm clock every time she met a clump of golden rod, or whatever they have in France to produce hay fever.”
“I could stay in the ambulance, Tish,” Aggie protested.
“I understand,” Tish went on, in an inflexible tone, “that those German snipers have got so that they shoot by ear. One sneeze would probably be fatal. Not only that,” she went on, turning to me, “but you know perfectly well, Lizzie, that a woman of your weight would be always stepping on brush and sounding like a night attack.”
“Not at all,” I replied, slightly ruffled. “And for a very good reason. I should not be there. As to my weight, Tish, my mother was always considered merely a fine figure of a woman, and I am just her size. It is only since this rage for skinny women——”
But Tish was not listening. She drew a deep sigh, and picked up her knitting again.