XXXVII
Loishad had no letter from the front for four days, which was a day longer than the longest between-time for a long while now, and she was feeling somewhat anxious.
“But,” she reassured herself, “delays must happen at times, and letters may even get lost. I have been wonderfully fortunate so far, and I will not be over-anxious or upset. If I have any belief at all in the efficacy of prayer I must keep my heart up and keep on hoping.”
And she prayed as she had never prayed before, but found herself bewildered at times when she thought that millions of other women were praying just as earnestly for their own dear ones, and it was impossible that all those prayers should be answered by the safe return of those they prayed for. Women in millions were praying and men in thousands were falling. Still she would go on praying and hoping. For there was nothing else she could do.
She prayed straight for Ray’s safe deliverance. She wondered at times if it were quite right to do so. But she went on praying for it, and as the days passed letterless spent much time upon her knees in great agony of mind, in spite of all her efforts after equanimity.
Why should he be spared when so many were taken? Yet, “Oh, deliver him from danger and send him back to me!” was the burden of her prayers, and at times she caught herself remonstrating with God against any smaller answer.
But by degrees she came to higher thought and sobbed, “I do not know what to ask for, Lord. Have him in Thy Care and do what is best for us.”
And it was while she was on her knees so praying one day, that there came a hasty tap on her door, and her mother’s voice—like the voice of an angel,—“Lois—a letter—from Ray,” and she thanked God fervently and ran to open the door.
There was no mistaking the handwriting. She kissed it delightedly, tore it open, and savoured its news almost at a glance.
“He is wounded,” she jerked, as she skimmed it rapidly for her mother’s benefit. “Getting over it all right.... Will be sent home shortly ... may be out of it for the rest of the war.... Oh, I can’t help wishing he might! Surely we have done our share, Mother!”
“Thank God, he is safe!” said Mrs Dare fervently.
“Now suppose you come downstairs and tell us all about it. Auntie Mitt is in a fever to know, and Vic is like a ghost.”
“I’ll follow you in one minute, dear,”—and on her knees she read her precious letter carefully through once more, then bowed her head in gratitude for its good news, and ran downstairs like herself again.
“I am glad, my dear,” said Auntie Mitt, with watery sparkles in her eyes, as Lois kissed her exuberantly, “—very glad indeed. Now we would like to hear all about it.”
“Sorry to have missed a mail or two, as I know it will have made you anxious,” Ray wrote, “but there was no help for it. We had a rather rough scrap with the Boches, the other night, and I got it at last in the arm,—the left fortunately, as you see. They attacked in force and we held them with the help of some brick-kilns and finally drove them off. One line in the papers, I expect,—if that!—but it was tolerably hot work. It was afterwards that I got my little jag. We were picking up wounded and came on an officer—a Prussian captain. He was under a pile of his own dead, and as we released him he pulled out an automatic and gave it me in the shoulder. Took off a bit of my ear also, but that’s atrifle——”
“Sorry to have missed a mail or two, as I know it will have made you anxious,” Ray wrote, “but there was no help for it. We had a rather rough scrap with the Boches, the other night, and I got it at last in the arm,—the left fortunately, as you see. They attacked in force and we held them with the help of some brick-kilns and finally drove them off. One line in the papers, I expect,—if that!—but it was tolerably hot work. It was afterwards that I got my little jag. We were picking up wounded and came on an officer—a Prussian captain. He was under a pile of his own dead, and as we released him he pulled out an automatic and gave it me in the shoulder. Took off a bit of my ear also, but that’s atrifle——”
“The horrid brute!” raged Lois.
“—He didn’t get much satisfaction out of it, however,”—said the letter—“for Sergeant Mac who was with me picked up a rifle and brained him on the spot.”
“—He didn’t get much satisfaction out of it, however,”—said the letter—“for Sergeant Mac who was with me picked up a rifle and brained him on the spot.”
“Served him right!” said Lois, and then remembered that two minutes ago she was on her knees thanking God for Ray’s safety. “It’s horrible. It makes one blood-thirsty to think of it.”
“It must be awful to be in it,” said Mrs Dare. “No wonder they do dreadful things at times, when simply hearing of a treachery like this makes our blood boil because it happens to come so close home to us.”
“It seems to me things are getting worse in war instead of better,” said Auntie Mitt plaintively.
“—They got me to the dressing station and tied me up, and eventually sent me down on the ambulance train to Boulogne, where I now am,—being very nicely attended to and as comfortable as can be. It is heavenly to be clean again and between clean sheets. It is not easy to know how we stood the trenches so well;—now that I’m out of them the conditions seem perfectly horrible. And yet we lived—and ‘for God’s sake smiled!’ They are saying that our stand that night saved a critical position. Several top-notties have called to congratulate me, and it’s said both Mac and I are to have the V.C. You see, we were lucky enough to bring in quite a respectable bag of wounded from the trench,—and so if I come back with only one armandthe V.C., you’ll have to try and put up with me as best you can.”
“—They got me to the dressing station and tied me up, and eventually sent me down on the ambulance train to Boulogne, where I now am,—being very nicely attended to and as comfortable as can be. It is heavenly to be clean again and between clean sheets. It is not easy to know how we stood the trenches so well;—now that I’m out of them the conditions seem perfectly horrible. And yet we lived—and ‘for God’s sake smiled!’ They are saying that our stand that night saved a critical position. Several top-notties have called to congratulate me, and it’s said both Mac and I are to have the V.C. You see, we were lucky enough to bring in quite a respectable bag of wounded from the trench,—and so if I come back with only one armandthe V.C., you’ll have to try and put up with me as best you can.”
“Won’t I?” said Lois rapturously.
“—Don’t think of coming out, dear. I know that would be your firstthought——”
“—Don’t think of coming out, dear. I know that would be your firstthought——”
“Of course it was!”
“—Everything is being done for me excellently well, and as soon as I am fit again, and properly rested, I shall be sent over. Your minds may be quite easy on my account.”
“—Everything is being done for me excellently well, and as soon as I am fit again, and properly rested, I shall be sent over. Your minds may be quite easy on my account.”
“Thank God, it is no worse!” said Mrs Dare fervently.
“Amen!” said Lois.
* * * * *
And there this brief glimpse into the home-side of the war-clouds may very well stop for the time being.
In this six short months, Life and Death have been busier among us all than ever before in the history of the world.
Old and young have lived mightily and died nobly. They have died like men and fallen like princes. Not one of the lives so freely given for The Great Idea has been wasted—not one. The life of the community at large, brought so closely into touch with death, has been quickened and raised to higher levels.
But the earth is full of mourning, for War is an evil evil thing, and its fiery trail is strewn with broken lives and broken hopes and broken hearts.
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