Margaret had neither seen nor heard anything of Michael since the eventful winter night when she had handed him a cup of coffee in the free-refreshment-room at the large northern station. She did not even know what regiment he was in. That, of course, was owing to her own stupidity; it was a matter of constant regret to her that she had not at the time had the forethought to ask the weeping woman on the platform what regiment her husband was in. Knowing nothing more than that Michael was at the Front, all she could do was to keep an eye on each day's casualty list in The Times newspaper. But even as her eyes hastily scanned the long columns of small print, she said to herself, "I need not look—his name will not be there. I have had my assurance of his safety."
She was certain now that the mystic message, which lay locked away in the dispatch-box which held her most important papers, had been sent to her to help her. It had been given to her to lessen her loneliness and to ease her anxiety.
Of course, this state of certainty had its feebler moments, and many, many times as she did her day's work she became affected by the waves of pessimism which spread at intervals over the British Isles. At these times she went about the pantry chalk-faced and tragic-eyed; but generally, when her suffering was becoming more than she could endure, from visualizing Michael blind, or limbless, or, still worse, an imbecile through shell-shock, a clear voice would speak to her, her super-self would repeat the contents of her treasured message.
The fact that her hand had written the message before and not after Michael's going to the Front established her confidence in it. If it had been after, her sound judgment told her that suggestion might have had something to do with the automatic writing.
It was early spring, and Margaret's country-loving nature cried out for the smell of damp fields, for the scents and the sounds of untrodden paths. The long twilight evenings seemed the loneliest hours to her in London. Their beauty was wasted. But the real country was denied her, for what distance could her two-hours-off take her from London? Scarcely beyond soot-blackened trees and the prim avenues of suburban respectability. But she had one great pleasure to look forward to—the Iretons were to be in London for the season, or, rather, what used to be termed the season in London.
They were to arrive in Clarges Street that very night. They were coming to England to help in the arrangements for the better equipping of native military hospitals in Egypt. Hadassah's knowledge of the native's likes and dislikes was considerable.
Margaret was now on her way to a tube railway-station. The afternoon was so glorious that she was going to make an excursion to Kew. She would just have time to look at the maythorns and hurry back. The one brave laburnum which gave brightness and fragrance to her garden-square told her that in the larger open spaces the flowering shrubs would be at their best.
As she ran down the steps of the tube station, she saw that a train which would take her to Hammersmith, where she would have to change for Kew Gardens, was drawn up at the platform; the passengers who were leaving it were trying to ascend the stairs. With youthful tightness she leapt down the last two or three steps and sprang across the platform. She only just had time to step into the train before the iron gates closed behind her.
A little breathless with excitement and greatly pleased that she had succeeded in catching the train, she obeyed the order of the officious guard to "Step along—don't block the gangway!"
The carriage was not full, but there were not many empty seats in it, so Margaret hastily sank into the one which was nearest to her and close to the door. It happened to be near to one on which a soldier was seated. His kit was lying at his feet in front of him. As she sat down, a voice said quietly: