Page:Ruth of the U.S.A. (IA ruthofusa00balm).pdf/199

 them—that they would have to be thrown in some day, without a chance. But they talked about coming to America after the war—the mining camps of Nevada and California, the Grand Cañon, Niagara Falls, and Mammoth Cave appealed to them, particularly. I asked '1583' once—I knew him best," Ruth said; and when she repeated the nickname for him it was with the wistful fondness with which only such a name may be said, "if he didn't want to go back home to England and Suffolkshire after the war. He said, I'm eager to stay a bit with the pater and the mater, naturally. She was imitating his voice; and Gerry saw that it made her cry; but she went on But I can't stay there, you know.'

"I asked, why.

My friends,' he said. 'I've not one now. You fancy you're attached to a place; but you find, you know, you've cared for more than that.' Then he changed the subject the way the English always do when you come to something they feel. He was with me the evening this battle began; and he knew what was coming. I didn't see him again till this morning—early this morning," she repeated as though unable to believe the shortness of the time. "He rode over to warn us; and then, a little later when I was getting my first party of people out of Mirevaux, I passed him with some more men just like him going to the firing. He knew he was going to be killed for he'd told us the Germans had broken through; and we couldn't hold them. But he wasn't thinking about that when he saw me. He just watched me as I was working 'to get my people in order and, as he rode past, he called out, 'Good old America!' That to me—one girl getting