Читать книгу The Girl Philippa - Robert W. Chambers - Страница 6

That night, lying awake on his bed in the Inn of the Golden Peach, Halkett heard the heavy rush of a southbound automobile passing under his window with the speed of an express train.

And he wondered whether the spongy morass by the little brook still held the long, grey touring car imprisoned.

He got up, went to his window and leaned out. Far away down the road the tail lamps of the machine twinkled, dwindled to sparks, and were engulfed in the invisible.

"More trouble south of me," he thought. But he returned to his bed and lay there, tranquil in the knowledge that when he started south alone on the morrow the envelope would not be on his person.

After a while he rose again, walked to the door connecting his room with Warner's, and opened it cautiously.

"I'm awake," said Warner in a low voice.

"Did you hear that car?"

"Yes. Was it the one that chased us?"

"I only guess so. Listen, Warner! When I go south tomorrow, what are you going to do with that envelope until I send a man back for it?"

"I've thought it all out, old chap. I shall take one of my new canvases, lay the envelope on it, cover envelope and canvas with a quarter of an inch of Chinese White, and when the enamel is dry I shall paint on it. By the way, did you do your telephoning to your satisfaction?"

"Entirely, thank you."

"You got your man?"

"I did," said Halkett. "He's on his way here now. Good night. I'll sleep like a fox, old chap!"

"Good night," said Warner cheerily, enamored with his invention for the safety of the envelope, as well as with the entire adventure.

That night, while they both slept, far away southward, on a lonely road in the Vosges, the car which had rushed by under their windows was now drawn up on the edge of the road.

Four men sat in it, waiting.

Just as dawn broke, what they awaited came up out of the south—a far, faint rattle announced it, growing rapidly louder; and a motor cyclist, riding without lights, shot out of the grey obscurity, trailing a comet's tail of dust.

Head-on he came, like a streak, caught sight suddenly of the motionless car and of four men standing up in it, ducked and flattened out over his handlebars as four revolvers poured forth streams of fire.

Motor cycle and rider swerved into the ditch with a crash; the latter, swaying wide in his saddle, was hurled a hundred feet further through the air, landing among the wild flowers on the bank above.

He was the man to whom Halkett had telephoned.

He seemed to be very young—an Englishman—with blood on his fair hair, and his blue eyes partly open.

They searched him thoroughly; and when they could find nothing more they lifted him between two of them; two others carried the wrecked motor cycle out across the fields toward the slope of a wooded mountain.

After ten minutes or so, two of the men returned to the car, drew a couple of short, intrenching spades from the tool box, and went away again across the fields toward the misty woods.

A throstle in a thorn bush had been singing all the while.

CHAPTER V

Halkett had not slept well; all night long in the garden under his window the nightingales had been very noisy. When he slept, sinister dreams had assailed him; cocks crowed at sunrise, cowbells tinkled, outside his drawn blinds a refreshed and garrulous world was awakening; and the happy tumult awoke him, too.

He was bathed, shaved, and dressed, and downstairs before Warner awoke at all; and he began to rove about the place which, by daylight, did not look at all like what he had imagined it to be the night before.

The Inn of the Golden Peach was one of those cream-tinted stucco houses built into and around a series of haphazard garden walls which inclosed flower and fruit gardens, cow-barns and stables. Its roof and wall copings were covered with red tiles, weather-faded to a salmon tint; two incredible climbing rosebushes nearly covered the front with delicate, salmon-pink blossoms, and, in the rear, flowers bloomed along stone-edged borders—masses of white clove pinks, rockets, poppies, heliotrope, reseda, portulaca, and pansies—a careless riot of color, apparently, yet set with that instinctive good taste which seldom fails in France and is common alike to aristocrat and peasant.

Beyond the strawberry beds were fruit trees, peach, cherry, plum, and apricot—the cherries hanging ripe and deeply crimson among dark green leaves, the apricots already golden, peaches and plums delicately painted with a bloom which promised approaching maturity.

Everywhere the grass grew thick and intensely green, though it was not very neatly kept; water ran out of a stone trough and made a dancing little rivulet over a bed of artificially set stones among which grew ferns. Beyond stood a trellised summerhouse, with iron tables and chairs painted green.

On the edge of the watering trough, Halkett seated himself in the sun. An immaculate tiger cat sat on the garden walk a few paces away, polishing her countenance with the velvet side of one forepaw, and occasionally polishing the paw with a delicate pink tongue.

Once or twice she looked at Halkett without any apparent interest; now and then she glanced up with more interest at the side of the house where, under the kitchen door, in a big basket-cage, a jay hopped about, making a scuffling noise among his cracked maize and rye straw.

However, the cat proved entirely susceptible to flattery, responded graciously to polite advances, and presently relapsed into a purring doze on his knee.

It was very still in the garden, too early even for butterflies to be abroad. The kitchen door remained closed; smoke had just begun to rise from one chimney.

In the peaceful silence nothing stirred; there was no breeze, no sound save the trickle of water among fern fronds.

Then, from nowhere apparently, into this golden tranquillity came a nun—no, not a nun, but one of those Grey Daughters of St. Vincent de Paul, who have "for their monastery the houses of the sick, for a cell a hired room, for a cloister the city streets, for a veil modesty."

In her white cornette, or pointed coiffe, with its starched wings, her snowy collarette, wide sleeves, grey apron, and grey-blue habit, she became instantly the medieval incarnation which vitalized the old garden and the ancient wall, so that the centuries they had witnessed were born again there where their spirit had returned, clothed in the costume which they had known so well.

The soeur de charité had not seen Halkett; she passed lightly, swiftly, along the flowering borders with scissors and ozier basket, bending here to gather the white clove pinks, kneeling there to snip off pansies.

And it was only when the grey cat leaped from Halkett's knees and advanced toward the Sister of Charity with a little mew of recognition that she turned, still kneeling, caught sight of Halkett, and remained looking at him, one delicate white hand resting on the purring cat.

Halkett was on his feet, his hat under his arm, now, and he bade her good-morning with that pleasant deference which marks such men immediately for what they are.

She smiled faintly from the transparent shadow of her white cornette.

"Flowers are all so lovely," she said, "it is never easy for me to choose. They are for my school, you know?"—with a slight rising inflection. But evidently this young man did not know, so she added, "I am Sister Eila," and smiled again, when it was apparent that he had never heard of Sister Eila.

"I am English," he said, "—traveling through France on business. I arrived last night to visit my friend, Mr. Warner. My name is Halkett."

She nodded and snipped a few more pansies.

"May I help you, Sister? If you don't mind telling me what flowers you desire——"

"Merci, Monsieur. Pansies, if you please. The children see odd little faces in their petals, and it amuses them."

Down on his knees beside the border, the grey cat seated between them, Halkett picked pansies and laid them in rows in her ozier basket.

"Of course," he said, "your school is a charity school."

"For the poor, of course. My children are those of the quarrymen."

"You do not teach them alone?"

"Oh, no. Sister Félicité teaches with me. And then, of course, we are together when, during the vacation, hospital service is required of us."

"Is there a quarry hospital?"

"Yes, Monsieur. It is more like an ambulance where first aid is given. The hospital at Ausone takes our sick." Still kneeling, she looked up at the slender fruit trees beyond, and the sunlight fell full on the most exquisite young face that Halkett had ever seen. Whether it was her unexpected beauty that gave him a little shock, or the sudden idea that in her features there was a haunting resemblance to somebody he had seen, perhaps met, he did not know.

Sometimes in the first glimpse of a face we recognize the living substance of her to whom we have aspired, and of whom we have dreamed. But she has never existed except in the heart which created her until we unconsciously endow another with all we dreamed she was.

He went on gathering flowers to fill her basket.

"I wonder," she said musingly, "whether any of those apricots are ripe. One of my children is convalescent, and she really needs a little fresh fruit."

So Halkett rose, threaded his way through the flowers, and looked carefully among the branches for a ripe apricot. He found two, and Sister Eila laid them together in the corner of her basket, which was now full.

He walked with her to the garden door, which was set solidly under an arch in the wall. There she looked up, smiling, as she said in English:

"Is not our country of Saïs very lovely, Mr. Halkett?"

"Yes, indeed, it is," he replied, also smiling in his surprise. "But, Sister Eila, you are English, are you not?"

"Irish—but brought up in France." ... Her face grew graver; she said very quietly: "Is it true there is any danger of war? The children are talking; it is evident that the quarrymen must be discussing such things among themselves. I thought I'd ask you——"

"I'm afraid," he said, "that there is some slight chance of war, Sister."

"Here in France?"

"Yes—here."

"It is Germany, of course?"

"Yes, the menace comes from—" he cast a quick glance toward the east, "—from over there.... Perhaps diplomacy may regulate the affair. It is always best to hope."

"Yes, it is best always—to hope," she said serenely.... "Thank you, Mr. Halkett. Mr. Warner is a friend of mine. Perhaps you may have time to visit our school with him."

"I'll come," said Halkett.

She smiled and nodded; he opened the heavy green door for her, and Sister Eila went out of the golden world of legend, leaving the flowers and young trees very still behind her.

CHAPTER VI

Warner discovered him there in the garden, seated once more on the stone trough, the grey cat dozing on his knees.

"Hello, old chap!" he said cheerfully. "Did you sleep?"

Halkett gave him a pleasant, absent-minded glance:

"Not very well, thanks."

"Nor I. Those damn nightingales kept me awake. Has your man arrived?"

"Not yet. I don't quite understand why."

Warner sauntered up and caressed the cat.

"Well, Ariadne, how goes it with you?" he inquired, gently rubbing her dainty ears, an attention enthusiastically appreciated, judging by the increased purring.

"Ariadne, eh?" inquired Halkett.

"Yes—her lover forsook her—although she doesn't seem to mind as much as the original lady did. No doubt she knows there's a Bacchus somewhere on his way to console her."

The other nodded in his pleasant, absent-minded fashion. After a moment he said:

"I've been talking to a Sister of Charity here in the garden."

"Sister Félicité?"

"No; Sister Eila."

"Isn't she the prettiest thing!" exclaimed Warner. "And she's as good as she is beautiful. We're excellent friends, Sister Eila and I. I'll take you over to her school after breakfast."

"It's the Grey Sisterhood, isn't it?"

"St. Vincent de Paul's Filles de la Charité; not the Grey Nuns, you know."

"I supposed not. Of course these nuns are not cloistered."

"They are not even nuns. They don't take perpetual vows."

Halkett looked up quickly.

"What!" he demanded.

"No. The vows of these Sisters of Charity are simple vows. They renew them annually. Still, it is a strict order. Their novitiate is five years' probation."

"Oh! I supposed——" He remained silent, his thoughtful gaze fixed on space.

"Yes, our brave gentle Sisters of Charity remain probationers for five years, and then every year they renew their vows of chastity, poverty, and obedience. The annual vows are taken some time in March, I believe. They have no cloister, you know, other than a room in some poor street near the school or hospital where they work. Did you ever hear the wonderful story of their Order?"

"No."

So Warner sketched for him the stainless history of a true saint, and of the Filles de St. Vincent de Paul through the centuries of their existence; and Halkett listened unstirring, his handsome head bent, his hand resting motionless on Ariadne's head.

A few minutes later a fresh-faced peasant girl, in scarlet bodice and velvet-slashed black skirts, came out into the garden bearing a tray with newly baked rolls, new butter, and café-au-lait for two. She placed it on the iron table in the little summerhouse, curtseyed to the two young men, exchanged a gay greeting with Warner, and trotted off again in her chaussons—the feminine, wholesome, and admirable symbol of all that is fascinating in the daughters of France.

Halkett placed Ariadne on the grass, rose, and followed Warner to the arbor; Ariadne tagged after them, making gentle but pleased remarks. There was an extra saucer, which Warner filled with milk and set before the cat.

"You know," he said to Halkett, "I like to eat by myself—or with some man. So I have my meals served out here, or in the tap room when it rains. The Harem feeds itself in the dining-room——"

"The what?"

"My class, I mean. An irreverent friend of mine in Paris dubbed it 'the Harem,' and the title stuck—partly, I suppose, because of its outrageous absurdity, partly because it's a terse and convenient title."

"They don't call it that, do they?"

"I should say not! And I hope they don't know that others do. Anyway, the Harem dawdles over its meals and talks art talk at the long table where Madame Arlon—the Patronne—presides. You'll have to meet them."

"Do you criticise your—Harem—this morning?" inquired Halkett, laughing.

"Yes; I give them their daily pabulum. Do you want to come about with me and see how it's done? After the distribution of pap I usually pitch my own umbrella somewhere away from their vicinity and make an hour's sketch. After that I paint seriously for the remainder of the day. But I'll take you over to Sister Eila's school this morning if you like." He fished out a black caporal cigarette and scratched a match.

Halkett, his cigarette already lighted, lounged sideways on the green iron chair, his preoccupied gaze fixed on Ariadne.

"Annual vows," he said, "mean, of course, that a Sister renews such vows voluntarily every year; does it not, Warner?"

"Yes."

"They usually do renew their vows, I suppose."

"Almost always, I believe."

"But—a Sister of Charity could return to the—the world, if she so desired?"

"It could be done, but it seldom is, I understand. The order is an admirable one; a very wonderful order, Halkett. They are careful about admitting their novices, but what they regard as qualifications might not be so considered in a cloistered order like the Ursalines. The novitiate is five years, I believe; except for the head of the order in Paris, no grades and no ranks exist; all Sisters are alike and on the same level." He smiled. "If anything could ever convert me to Catholicism, I think it might be this order and the man who founded it, Saint Vincent de Paul, wisest and best of all who have ever tried to follow Christ."

Ariadne had evidently centered her gentle affections upon the new Englishman; she trotted at his heels as he sauntered about in the garden; she showed off for his benefit, playfully patting a grasshopper into flight, frisking up trees only to cling for a moment, ears flattened, and slide back to earth again; leaping high after lazy white butterflies which hovered over the heliotrope, but always returning to tag after Halkett where he roamed about, a burnt-out cigarette between his fingers, his eyes dreaming, lost in speculations beyond the ken of any cat.

The Harem came trooping into the garden, presently, shepherded by Warner. They all carried full field kit—folding easels, stools, and umbrellas slung upon their several and feminine backs; a pair of clamped canvases in one hand, color-box in the other.

Halkett was presented to them all. There was Miss Alameda Golden, from California, large, brightly colored, and breezy; there was Miss Mary Davis, mouse-tinted, low-voiced, who originated in Brooklyn; there was Miss Jane Post, of Chicago, restlessly intense and intellectually curious concerning all mundane phenomena, from the origin of café-au-lait to the origin of species; and there was Miss Nancy Lane, of New York, a dark-eyed opportunist and an observer of man—sometimes individually, always collectively. And there was Miss Peggy Brooks, cosmopolitan, sister of Madame de Moidrey who lived in a big house among the hills across the meadows—the Château des Oiseaux, prettily named because the protection and encouragement of little birds had been the immemorial custom of its lordly proprietors.

And so the Harem, fully equipped to wrestle with the giant, Art, filed out of the quiet garden and across the meadows by the little river Récollette, where were haystacks, freshly erected and fragrant, which very unusual subject they had unanimously chosen for their morning's crime.

To perpetrate it upon canvas they pitched their white umbrellas, tripod easels, and sketching stools; then each maiden, taking a determined grip upon her charcoal, squinted, so to speak, in chorus at the hapless haystacks. And the giant, Art, trembled in the seclusion of the ewigkeit.

Warner regarded them gloomily; Halkett, who had disinterred a pipe from his pockets, stood silently beside him, loading it.

"They'll paint this morning, and after luncheon," said Warner. "After dinner they all get into an omnibus and drive to Ausone to remain overnight, and spend tomorrow in street sketching. I insist on their doing this once every month. When they return with their sketches, I give them a general criticism."

"Will these young ladies ever really amount to anything?" inquired Halkett.

"Probably never. Europe, the British Isles, and the United States are dotted all over with similar and feminine groups attempting haystacks. The sum-total of physical energy thus expended must be enormous—like the horsepower represented by Niagara. But it creates no ripple upon the intellectual serenity of the thinking world. God alone knows why women paint haystacks. I do my best to switch them toward other phenomena."

The rural postman on his bicycle, wearing képi and blue blouse, came pedaling along the highway. When he saw Warner he saluted and got off his wheel.

"Letters, Grandin?"

"Two, Monsieur Warner."

Warner took them.

"Eh, bien?" he inquired, lowering his voice; "et la guerre?"

"Monsieur Warner, the affair is becoming very serious."

"What is the talk in Ausone?"

"People are calm—too calm. A little noise, now, a little gesticulation, and the affair would seem less ominous to me—like the Algeciras matter and the Schnaeble incident before that—Monsieur may remember?"

"I know. It is like the hush before a tempest. The world is too still, the sunlight too perfect."

"There seems to me," said the little postman, "a curious unreality about yesterday and today—something in the cloudless peace overhead that troubles men."

Being no more and no less poet than are all French peasants, this analysis sufficed him. He touched his képi; the young men lifted their hats, and the postman pedaled away down the spotless military road.

Warner glanced at the envelope in his hand; Halkett looked at it, too. It was addressed in red ink.

"It's for me, old chap," said the Englishman.

The other glanced up, surprised.

"Are you sure?"

"Quite—if you don't mind trusting me."

Warner laughed and handed him the letter.

"It's addressed very plainly to me," he said. "You've got your nerve with you, Halkett."

"I have to keep it about me, old chap."

"No doubt. And still I don't see——"

"It's very simple. I sent two telephone messages last night. One letter should have arrived. It has not! The man who wrote this letter must have gone miles last night on a motor cycle to mail it so that your little postman should hand it to me this morning——"

"Intriguer!" interrupted Warner, still laughing. "He handed it to me! I see you're going to get me in Dutch before I'm rid of you."

"I don't comprehend your Yankee slang," retorted Halkett with a slight grin, "so if you don't mind I'll sit here on the grass and read my letter. Go on and criticize your Harem. But before you go, lend me a pencil. They stole even my pencil in the Cabaret de Biribi."

Warner, amused, handed him a pencil and a pad, and strolled away toward the industrious Harem to see what they might be perpetrating.

Halkett seated himself on the grass where, if he chose to glance up, he had a clear view all about him. Then he opened his letter.

It was rather an odd sort of letter. It began:

DEAR GREEN:

A red wagon, red seat, orange rumble, red mudguards, blue steering-wheel, red bumpers, blue wheels, red engines, red varnish, red open body, red machinery, red all over, in fact, except where it isn't—is for sale.

So much of this somewhat extraordinary letter Halkett very carefully and slowly perused; then, still studying this first paragraph intently, he wrote down on his pad the following letters in the following sequence, numbering each letter underneath:

R O Y G B I V S W A

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0

The letters represented, up to and including the letter V, the colors of the solar spectrum in their proper sequence: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet. The letter S, which followed the letter V, stood for schwarz, which in German means black. The letter W stood for weiss, white; the letter A for argent. Every letter, therefore, represented some color or metallic luster; and these, in turn, represented numbers.

And now Halkett took the opening salutation in the first paragraph of his letter—"Dear Green." The color green being numbered 4, he found that the fourth letter in the word "dear" was the letter R. This he wrote down on his pad.

Then he took the next few words: "A red wagon, red seat, orange rumble, red——" etc.

The first and only letter in the word "A" he wrote down. The next word after "wagon" was "red." The color red indicated the figure 1. So he next wrote down the first letter of the word "wagon," which is W.

Then came the word "seat." The word "orange" followed it. The color orange indicated number 2 in the spectrum sequence. So he found that in the word "seat" the letter E was the second letter. This he wrote.

Very carefully and methodically he proceeded in this manner with the first paragraph of the letter, as far as the words "all over," but not including them or any of the words in the first paragraph which followed them.

He had, therefore, for his first paragraph, this sequence of letters:

RAWERUSEWEVOM.

Beginning with the last letter, M, he wrote the letters again, reversing their sequence; and he had:

MOVEWESUREWAR.

These, with commas, he easily separated into four words: "Move," "we," "sure," and "war." Then, again reversing the sequence of the words, he had two distinct sentences of two words each before him:

WAR SURE! WE MOVE!

Always working with the numbered color key before him, taking his letter paragraph by paragraph, he had as a final remainder the following series of letters:

EDIHUOYERADELIARTTIAWDROWOTDEECORPSIALAC.

Reversing these, checking off the separate words, and then reversing the entire sequence of words, he had as the complete translation of his letter, including the first paragraph, the following information and admonition:

"War sure. We move. Hide. You are trailed. Wait word to proceed Calais."

"War sure!" That was easily understood. "We move." That meant England was already mobilizing on land and sea. And the remainder became plain enough; he must stay very quietly where he was until further instructions arrived.

He read through his notes and his letter once more, then twisted letter, envelope, and penciled memoranda into a paper spiral, set fire to it with a match, and leisurely lighted his pipe with it.

When the flame of the burning paper scorched his fingers, he laid it carefully on the grass, where it was presently consumed. The charred remnants he ground to dust under his heel as he got up and brushed a spear or two of hay from his clothing.

Then he looked at the Harem, all busily committing felony with brush and colors; and, as he gazed upon them, he politely stifled a yawn.

CHAPTER VII

Warner, conscientious but not hopeful, circulated among the easels of the Harem. Halkett strolled at his heels.

Stopping in front of Alameda Golden's large canvas, which was all splashed with primary and aggressive colors, he gazed, uncomforted, upon what she had wrought there. After a few moments he said very patiently:

"You should not use a larger canvas than I have recommended to the class. Mere size is not necessarily a synonym for distinction, nor does artistic strength depend upon the muscular application of crude paint. A considerable majority of our countrymen comprehend only what is large, gaudy, and garrulous. Bulk and noise only can command their attention. On the other hand, only what is weak, vague, and incoherent appeals to the precious—the incapables and eccentrics among us. But there is a sane and healthy majority: enroll yourself there, Miss Golden!

"Be honest, reticent, and modest. If you have anything to say in paint, say it without self-consciousness, frankly, but not aggressively. Behave on canvas as you would bear yourself in the world at large, with freedom but with dignity, with sincerity governed by that intelligent consideration for truth which permits realism and idealism, both of which are founded upon fact."

Miss Golden pouted:

"But I see haystacks this way!" she insisted. "I see them in large and brilliant impressions. To me nothing looks like what it is. Haystacks appear this way to my eyes!"

"My dear child, then paint them that way. But the popular impression will persist that you have painted the battle of Trafalgar."

Miss Golden wriggled on her camp chair.

"Everything," she explained, "is one monstrous, gaudy, and brutal impression to me. I see a million colors in everything and very little shape to anything. I see only cosmic vigor; and I paint it with a punch. Can't you see all those colors in those haystacks? To me they resemble gigantic explosions of glorious color. And really, Mr. Warner, if I am to be true to myself, I must paint them as I see them."

Warner, horribly discouraged, talked sanely to her for a while, then with a pleasant nod he passed to the next easel, remarking to Halkett under his breath:

"It's a case for a pathologist, not for a painter."

And so for an hour he prowled about among the Harem, ministering to neurotics, inspiring the sluggish, calming despair, gently discouraging self-complacency.

"Always," he said, "we must remain students, because there is no such thing as mastery in any art. If ever we believe we have attained mastery, then our progress ceases; and we do not even remain where we are; we retrograde—and swiftly, too.

"The life work of the so-called 'master' is passed only in solving newer problems. There is no end to the problems, there is an end only to our lives.

"Look at the matter in that way, not as a race toward an attainable goal, nor as an eternally hopeless effort in a treadmill; but as a sane and sure and intelligent progress from one wonder-chamber to a chamber still more wonderful—locked rooms which contain miracles, and which open only when we find the various keys which fit their locks....

"That is all for this morning, young ladies."

He lifted his hat, turned, and strolled away across the meadow, Halkett at his side.

"Some lecture!" he commented with a faint grin.

"It's sound," said Halkett.

"I do the best I can with them. One might suppose I know how to paint, by the way I pitch into those poor girls. Yet, I myself never pick up a brush and face my canvas but terror seizes me, and my own ignorance of all I ought to know scares me almost to death. It's not modesty; I can paint as well as many, better than many. But, oh, the long, long way there is to travel! The stars are very far away, Halkett."

He pitched his easel, secured a canvas, took a freshly-set palette and brushes from his color-box, and, still standing, went rapidly about his business, which was to sketch in an impression of what lay before him.

Halkett, watching him over his shoulder, saw the little river begin to glimmer on the canvas, saw a tender golden light grow and spread, bathing distant hills; saw the pale azure of an arching sky faintly tinting with reflections the delicate green of herbage still powdered with the morning dew.

"This is merely a note," remarked Warner, painting away leisurely but steadily. "Some day I may pose my models somewhere outdoors under similar weather conditions; and you may see dragoons in their saddles, carbines poised, the sunlight enveloping horses and men—or perhaps a line of infantry advancing in open order with shrapnel exploding in their faces.... Death in the summer sunshine is the most terrifying of tragedies.... I remember once after Lule Burgas—— Never mind, I shan't spoil the peaceful beauty of such a morning.

"War? War here!—In this still meadow, bathed in the heavenly fragrance of midsummer! ... Well, Halkett, the government of any nation which attacks another nation is criminal, and all the arguments of church and state and diplomacy cannot change that hellish fact.

"There is only one right in any combat, only one side in any war. And no reasoning under the sun can invest an aggressor with that right.

"He who first draws and strikes forestalls God's verdict."

Halkett said:

"How about your own wars?"

"Halkett, the United States is the only nation which ever entered a war from purely sentimental reasons. It was so in the Revolution; it was so in 1812, in the War of Secession, in Mexico, in the Cuban War.

"All our wars have been undertaken in response to armed aggression; all were begun and carried on in defense of purely sentimental principles. I do not say it because I am a Yankee, but our record is pretty clean, so far, in a world which, since our birth, has accused us of ruthless materialism."

He continued to paint for a while in silence; and when his color notes were sufficiently complete for his purpose, and when the Harem had filed before the canvas and had adoringly inspected it, Warner packed up his kit, and, taking the wet canvas, walked with Halkett back to the Golden Peach.

There Halkett was made acquainted with Madame Arlon, the stout, smiling proprietress of the inn, who sturdily refused to believe that war was possible, and who explained why to Halkett with animation while Warner went indoors to deposit his sketches in his studio.

He returned presently, saying that he would take Halkett to Sister Eila's school across the fields; so the two young men lighted their pipes and strolled away together through the sunshine.

Eastward, far afield, the gay aprons and sunbonnets of the Harem still dotted the distance with flecks of color; beyond, the Récollette glimmered, and beyond that hazy hills rolled away southward toward the Vosges country.

Halkett looked soberly into the misty east.

"It won't come from that direction," he said, half to himself.

Warner glanced up, understood, and sauntered on in silence.

"By the way," remarked the Englishman, "I shall stay here tonight."

"I'm very glad," returned Warner cordially.

"So am I, Warner. Ours is an agreeable—acquaintance."

"It amounts to a little more than that, doesn't it?"

"Yes. It's a friendship, I hope."

"I hope so."

After a moment he added laughingly:

"I've fixed up your bally envelope for you."

"How?"

"Covered it with a thick, glossy layer of Chinese white. I put in a dryer. In a day or two I shall make a pretty little picture on it. And nobody on earth could suspect that embedded under the paint and varnish of my canvas your celebrated document reposes."

They took a highway to the left, narrow and tree-shaded.

"When do you get the newspapers here?" inquired Halkett.

"After lunch, usually. The Petit Journal d'Ausone arrives then. Nobody bothers with any Paris papers. But I think I shall subscribe, now.... There's the school, just ahead."

It was a modern and very plain two-storied building of stone and white stucco, covered with new red tiles. A few youthful vines were beginning to climb gratefully toward the lower window sills; young linden trees shaded it. A hum, like the low, incessant murmur of a hive, warned them as they approached that the children were reciting in unison; and they halted at the open door.

Inside the big, clean room, the furniture of which was a stove and a score or more of desks, two dozen little girls, neatly but very poorly dressed, stood beside their desks reciting. On a larger desk stood a glass full of flowers which Halkett recognized; and beside this desk, slenderly erect, he saw Sister Eila, facing the children, her white hands linked behind her back.

Seated behind the same desk was another Sister—a buxom one with the bright, clear coloring of a healthy peasant—more brilliant, even, for the white wimple, collarette, and wide-winged headdress which seemed to accent the almost riotous tint of physical health.

The childish singsong presently ceased; Sister Eila turned pensively, took a step or two, lifted her eyes, and beheld Halkett and Warner at the doorway.

"Oh!" she exclaimed. "Please come in, Messieurs. I have been wondering whether Mr. Warner would bring you before luncheon.... Sister Félicité, this is Monsieur Halkett, who so amiably aided me to gather my bouquet this morning."

Sister Félicité became all animation and vigor; she was cordial to Halkett, greeted Warner with the smiling confidence of long acquaintance.

It lacked only a few minutes to noon, and so lessons were suspended, and the children put through one or two drills for Halkett's benefit.

Out in the kitchen a good, nourishing broth was simmering for them, and Sister Eila slipped away during the brief exhibition to prepare twenty-four bowls and spoons and tartines for these ever-hungry little children of the poor, orphaned for the most part, or deserted, or having parents too poor to feed them.

At noon Sister Félicité dismissed the school; and the little girls formed in line very demurely and filed off to the kitchen.

"What a delicious odor!" exclaimed Halkett, nose in the air.

Sister Félicité sniffed the soup.

"We do our best," she said. "The poor little things fatten here, God be praised." And, to Warner, in her vigorous, alert manner: "What is all this talk concerning war? The children prattle about it. They must have heard such gossip among the quarry people."

Warner said:

"It begins to look rather serious, Sister."

"Is it Germany again?"

"I fear so."

Sister Félicité's pink cheeks flushed:

"Is it the noisy boaster who rules those Germans who would bring the sword upon us again? Is there not enough of barbaric glory in his Empire for him and his that he should invade the civilized world to seek for more? It is a vile thing for any man, be he ruler or subject, to add one featherweight to the crushing burden of the world's misery!"

"To declare war is the heaviest of all responsibilities," admitted Warner.

"Is it already declared?"

"No. That is to say, Austria has declared war against Servia, Russia is mobilizing, and Germany has warned her."

"Is that an excuse for anybody to attack France?"

"Russia is mobilizing, Sister," he repeated meaningly.

"What then?"

"France must follow."

"And then?"

Warner shrugged his shoulders.

Sister Eila came out, nodding to Sister Félicité, who usually presided at the lunch hour: and the latter went away with Warner toward the kitchen, still plying the American with questions. Sister Eila bent her head, inhaled the perfume of the flowers on her desk, and then looked up at Halkett.

"Don't you ever lunch?" he asked.

"Yes; I tasted the soup. You lunch at one at the inn."

"I suppose so. What a charming country this is—this little hamlet of Saïs! Such exquisite peace and stillness I have seldom known."

Sister Eila's eyes grew vague; she looked out through the sunny doorway across the fields towards a range of low hills. The quarries were there.

"It is a tranquil country," she said pensively, "but there is misery, too. Life in the quarries is hard, and wages are not high."

"Mr. Warner tells me they are a hard lot, these quarrymen."

"There is intemperance among the quarrymen, and among the cement workers, too: and there is roughness and violence—and crime, sometimes. But it is a very hard métier, Mr. Halkett, and the lime dust blinds and sears and incites a raging thirst. God knows there is some excuse for the drunkenness there. We who are untempted must remain gentle in our judgments."

"I could not imagine Sister Eila judging anybody harshly."

Sister Eila looked up and laughed:

"Oh, Mr. Halkett, I have confessed to impatience too many times to believe that I could ever acquire patience. Only today I scolded our children because they tore down a poster which had been pasted on the public wall at the crossroad. I said to them very severely, 'It is a sin to destroy what others have paid for to advertise their merchandise.'"

"That was a terrible scolding," admitted Halkett, laughing.

"I'll show you the poster," volunteered Sister Eila, going over to her desk. Raising the lid, she picked up and displayed an advertisement.