The Tin Soldier Part 12

Alma, having turned a cold shoulder to Ralph, was still proclaiming her opinion of Derry Drake to the rest of the table. "He is rich and young and he doesn't want to die--"

"There are plenty of rich young men dying, Alma," said Mrs.

Witherspoon, "and it is probably as easy for them as for the poor ones--"

"The poor ones won't mind being muddy and dirty in the trenches," said Alma, "but I can't fancy Derry Drake without two baths a day--"

"I can't quite fancy him a slacker." There was a hint of satisfaction in Mrs. Witherspoon's voice. Her son and Derry Drake had gone to school together and to college. Derry had outdistanced Ralph in every way; but now it was Ralph who was leaving Derry far behind.

Jean wished that they would stop talking. She felt as she might had she seen a soldier stripped of sword and stripes and shamed in the eyes of his fellows.

"Wasn't he in the draft?" she asked Ralph.

"Too old. He doesn't look it, does he? It's a bit hard for the rest of us fellows to understand why he keeps out--"

"Doesn't he ever try to--explain?"

Ralph shook his head. "Not a word. And he's beginning to stay away from things. You see, he knows that people are asking questions, and you hear what they are calling him?"

"Yes," said Jean, "a coward."

"Well, not exactly that--"

"There isn't much difference, is there?"

And now Alma's cool voice summed up the situation. "A man with as much money as that doesn't have to be brave. What does he care about public opinion? After the war everybody will forgive and forget."

Coolly she challenged them to contradict her. "You all know it. How many of you would dare cut the fellow who will inherit his father's millions?"

Mrs. Witherspoon tried to laugh it off; but it was true, and Alma was right. They might talk about Derry Drake behind his back, but they'd never omit sending a card to him.

Jean ate her duckling in flaming silence, ate her salad, ate her ice, drank her coffee, and was glad when the meal ended.

The war from the beginning had been for her a sacred cause. She had yearned to be a man that she might stand in the forefront of battle.

She had envied the women of Russia who had formed a Battalion of Death.

Her father had laughed at her. "You'd be like a white kitten in a dog fight."

It seemed intolerable that tongues should be busy with this talk of young Drake's cowardice. He had seemed something so much more than that. And he was a man--with a man's right to leadership. What was the matter with him?

The night before she had slept little--Derry's voice--Derry's eyes!

She had gone over every word that he had said. She had risen early in the morning to write in her memory book, and she had drawn a most entrancing border about the page, with melting strawberry ice, lilies of France, Cinderella slippers, and red-ink lobsters, rather nightmarishly intermingled!

He had seemed so fine--so--she fell back on her much overworked word _wonderful_--her heart had run to meet him, and now--it would have to run back again. How silly she had been not to see.

After dinner they danced in the Long Room, which was rather famous from a decorative point of view. It was medieval in effect, with a balcony and tapestries, and some precious bits of armor. There was a lion-skin flung over the great chair where Mrs. Witherspoon was enthroned.

Between dances, Jean and Ralph sat on the balcony steps, and talked of many things which brought the red to Jean's cheeks, and a troubled light into her eyes.

And it was from the balcony-steps that, as the evening waned, she saw Derry Drake standing in the great arched doorway.

There was a black velvet curtain behind him which accentuated his fairness. He did not look nineteen. Jean had a fleeting vision of a certain steel engraving of the "Princes in the Tower" which had hung in her grandmother's house. Derry was not in the least like those lovely imprisoned boys, yet she had an overwhelming sense of his kinship to them.

As young Drake's eyes swept the room, he was aware of Jean on the balcony steps. She was in white and silver, with a touch of that heavenly blue which seemed to belong to her. Her crinkled hair was combed quaintly over her ears and back from her forehead. He smiled at her, but she apparently did not see him.

He made his way to Mrs. Witherspoon. "I was so sorry to get here late.

But my other engagements kept me. If I could have dined at two places, you should have had at least a half of me."

"We wanted the whole. You know Dr. McKenzie, Derry?"

The two men shook hands. "May I dance with your daughter?" Derry said, smiling.

"Of course. She is up there on the stairs."

Jean saw him coming. Ever since Derry had stood in the door she had been trying to make up her mind how she would treat him when he came.

Somebody ought to show him that his millions didn't count. She hadn't thought of his millions last night. If he had been just the shabby boy of the Toy Shop, she would have liked his eyes just as much, and his voice!

But a slacker was a slacker! A coward was a coward! All the money in the world couldn't take away the stain. A man who wouldn't fight at this moment for the freedom of the world was a renegade! She would have none of him.

He came on smiling. "h.e.l.lo, Ralph. Miss McKenzie, your father says you may dance with me--I hope you have something left?"

The blood sang in her ears, her cheeks burned.

"I haven't anything left--for you--" The emphasis was unmistakable.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "I haven't anything left for you."]

Even then he did not grasp what had happened to him. "Ralph will let me have one of his--be a good sport, Ralph."

"Well, I like that," Ralph began. Then Jean's crisp voice stopped him.

"I am not going to dance any more--my head aches. I--I shall ask Daddy to take me--home--"

It was all very young and obvious. Derry gave her a puzzled stare.

Ralph protested. "Oh, look here, Jean. If you think you aren't going to dance any more with me."

"Well, I'm not. I am going home. Please take me down to Daddy."

It seemed a long time before the blurred good-byes were said, and Jean was alone with her father in the cozy comfort of the closed car.

"Do you love me, Daddy?"

"My darling, yes."

"May I live with you always--to the end of my days?"

He chuckled. "So that was it? Poor Ralph!"

"You know you are not sorry for him, Daddy. Don't be a hypocrite."

He drew her close to him. "I should be sorry for myself if he took you from me."