Page:Ralph Paine--The praying skipper.djvu/237

Rh The uproarious "Shorty" opened the bundle and disclosed a jade teapot, in a wrapping of wadded silk. It was a flawless bit of carving, fashioned from a solid block of imperial green jade, no more than a pretty toy to the soldiers, who examined it indifferently and wondered why Saunders wished to send it to his mother.

"It's the last thing I've got," he explained, "and the last present they'll ever get from me. I think they'd like to know I wasn't so blamed forgetful at the finish. Just lug it along, Shorty, an' if it don't get broke on the way, you can mail it when you cross the country."

The wish and the token were a sick man's whim to Blake, but he wrapped the jade teapot and tucked it in a soft corner of his haversack when he packed his kit late that night. He was vaguely aware that his purpose of finding the distressed family of Saunders would not survive the journey home, yet he had meant it when he made the promise. He believed Saunders as good as dead, because he had seen men die of homesickness in the field hospitals of the Philippines.