“Why didn’t you let him come? Dear old Kent!” exclaimed Molly.
“Well, I knew perfectly well that it is some job to sleep seven persons outside of one’s own household, and it is doubly difficult when there are two sexes. Kent is as busy as can be anyhow: drilling day and night.”
Kent Brown had taken the training at Plattsburg and was then engaged in passing on this training to a company of militia in New York. He and Judy were eagerly awaiting the declaration of war by the United States. There was no such thing as neutrality for them. Having been in France in that August of 1914, Judy considered herself already at war and Kent enthusiastically shared the sentiments of his wife. He was prepared to leave his profession of architecture, in which he was proving himself very successful, and join any regiment that was likely to see service.
Judy had done exactly what the Marquis d’Ochtè had asked her to do: she had come back to New York and plunged into war relief work. Because of her enthusiasm and untiring energy she had been of great assistance in recruiting workers. Her admiring husband said that she was what one might call a real booster. Any campaign Judy plunged in was sure to be a whirlwind campaign. She had her father’s capacity for infinite work. Up to a certain period it had evinced itself in the form of infinite play, but now that the serious side of life had presented itself to her, the girl was working quite as hard as she had ever played. There was never anything half-way about our Judy. In New York she was canvassing for suffrage, keeping up her painting, and with her own hands cutting and folding enough surgical dressings to fill the peace ship, besides rounding up many workers for the cause. With it all she managed to be a very satisfactory wife and housekeeper. She and Kent were blissfully happy. There were red letter days in their calendar when both of them stopped working and went on some mad frolic. They had made many friends in New York, friends with whom they both worked and played. They had a hospitable apartment where the redoubtable Ca’line reigned in the tiny kitchen, Ca’line, trained by Mrs. Brown at Chatsworth and chastened by dear old Aunt Mary until she “knowed her place an’ kep’ it.”
Isn’t it fun to see Judy again? I hope my readers feel as glad for her to come bounding into these pages as the Greens and Nance Oldham did when she opened the door of the library at the Square Deal and, upsetting everything, scattered papers and parcels hither and yon, her vivid personality permeating every corner of the room.
Just before Judy said good-night, she paused and exclaimed, “I must tell you, Molly, how much I enjoy the dear little Virginia girls you have passed on to me. The Tucker twins and Page Allison are just about the nicest girls I know, and Mary Flannagan is a duck. I used to be an awful snob about college girls,—somehow, I thought girls who did not go to college were not worth knowing, but I have changed my mind since I have met these girls. They are an interesting lot and as far as I can see know as much as we do.”
“I knew you would like them. I simply fell in love with them last spring in Charleston. Have you met their father?”
“No, but he must be some father! The girls call him Zebedee, which appeals to me, having always called mine Bobby.”
“Zebedee? What a strange name!” said Nance.
“They say it is because nobody ever believes he is their father and so they want to know: ‘Who is the father of Zebedee’s children?’ It seems he is only about twenty years older than they are and is one of those persons who never gets on in years. They declare they are really more mature than he is and not nearly so agile,” laughed Judy.