The Rough Road Part 25

It was only in the afternoon that he saw the girl again. She was standing in the doorway of the house, with her hand on her bosom, as though she had just come out to breathe fresh air, when Doggie and his two friends emerged from the yard. As their eyes met, she greeted him with her sad little smile. Emboldened, he stepped forward.

"_Bon jour, mademoiselle._"

"_Bon jour, monsieur._"

"I hope madame your aunt is better to-day."

She seemed to derive some dry amus.e.m.e.nt from his solicitude.

"Alas, no, monsieur."

"Was that why I had not the pleasure of seeing you this morning?"

"Where?"

"Yesterday you filled our tea-kettles."

"But, monsieur," she replied primly, "I am not the _vivandiere_ of the regiment."

"That's a pity," laughed Doggie.

Then he became aware of the adjacent forms and staring eyes of Phineas and Mo, who for the first time in their military career beheld him on easy terms with a strange and prepossessing young woman. After a second's thought he came to a diplomatic decision.

"Mademoiselle," said he, in his best Durdlebury manner, "may I dare to present my two comrades, my best friends in the battalion, Monsieur McPhail, Monsieur Shendish?"

She made them each a little formal bow, and then, somewhat maliciously, addressing McPhail, as the bigger and the elder of the two:

"I don't yet know the name of your friend."

Phineas put his great hand on Doggie's shoulder.

"James Marmaduke Trevor."

"Otherwise called Doggie, miss," said Mo.

She made a little graceful gesture of non-comprehension.

"_Non compree?_" asked Mo.

"No, monsieur."

Phineas explained, in his rasping and consciously translated French:

"It is a nickname of the regiment. Doggie."

The flushed and embarra.s.sed subject of the discussion saw her lips move silently to the word.

"But his name is Trevor. Monsieur Trevor," said Phineas.

She smiled again. And the strange thing about her smile was that it was a matter of her lips and rarely of her eyes, which always maintained the haunting sadness of their tragic depths.

"Monsieur Trevor," she repeated imitatively. "And yours, monsieur?"

"McPhail."

"Mac-Fele; _c'est a.s.sez difficile_. And yours?"

Mo guessed. "Shendish," said he.

She repeated that also, whereat Mo grinned fatuously, showing his little yellow teeth beneath his scrubby red moustache.

"My friends call me Mo," said he.

She grasped his meaning. "Mo," she said; and she said it so funnily and softly, and with ever so little a touch of quizzicality, that the sentimental warrior roared with delight.

"You've got it right fust time, miss."

From her two steps' height of vantage, she looked down on the three upturned British faces--and her eyes went calmly from one to the other.

She turned to Doggie. "One would say, monsieur, that you were the Three Musketeers."

"Possibly, mademoiselle," laughed Doggie. He had not felt so light-hearted for many months. "But we lack a d'Artagnan."

"When you find him, bring him to me," said the girl.

"Mademoiselle," said Phineas gallantly, "we would not be such imbeciles."

At that moment the voice of Toinette came from within.

"Ma'amselle Jeanne! Ma'amselle Jeanne!"

"_Oui, oui, j'y viens_," she cried. "_Bon soir, messieurs_," and she was gone.

Doggie looked into the empty vestibule and smiled at the friendly brandy cask. Provided it is p.r.o.nounced correctly, so as to rhyme with the English "Anne," it is a very pretty name. Doggie thought she looked like Jeanne--a Jeanne d'Arc of this modern war.

"Yon's a very fascinating la.s.sie," Phineas remarked soberly, as they started on their stroll. "Did you happen to observe that all the time she was talking so prettily she was looking at ghosts behind us?"

"Do you think so?" asked Doggie, startled.

"Man, I know it," replied Phineas.

"Ghosts be blowed!" cried Mo Shendish. "She's a bit of orl right, she is.

What I call cla.s.s. Doesn't chuck 'erself at yer 'ead, like some of 'em, and, on the other 'and, has none of yer blooming stand-orfishness. See what I mean?" He clutched them each by an arm--he was between them.

"Look 'ere. How do you think I could pick up this blinking lingo--quick?"

"Make violent love to Toinette and ask her to teach you. There's nothing like it," said Doggie.

"Who's Toinette?"