"He was probably asking you how much your dowry was."
"Maybe, but his eyes didn't ask me that. And that was all. I never saw him again, and I don't ever expect to."
"They're horrible tyrants, English husbands," said Marjie, kissing his arm.
"Not so bad as German ones," he replied, putting his head down to hers.
The casements rattled. Into the little dark square of the compartment window peered a confusion of lights, the myriad eyes of a great city.
"Why, it's London!" cried Marjorie. "I'd lost all track of time. Hadn't you, Leonard?"
"No," he answered laconically, slamming down the lid of the tea-basket.
But Marjorie squeezed up against him and gave a little laugh. "Supposing it could be the same man, Leonard," she said.
"What man?" asked Leonard, snapping the lock.
"Why, the man of the Helmet--the Dying Gaul--and my man I've been telling you about."
Leonard looked at her, and for some reason his eyes flinched. "What difference would that make? He was German," was all he said.
It was a sultry evening. Flowers were being sold in profusion on street corners. Hurdy-gurdies played war tunes in the gutter. The streets were filled with soldiers in khaki and florid civilians in their summer clothes. Suddenly she remembered a passage in the Bible that always seemed beautiful to her, but now it seemed to have been specially written for her:--
"Where thou goest, I will go, And where thou lodgest, I will lodge. Thy people shall be my people, And thy God, my God."
She walked as close to Leonard as she dared: "Thy people shall be my people, And thy God, my God."
The passers-by smiled at her and turned and stared after. "Awfully hard on a girl," they thought, touched by the rapt look on the young face.
"Oh, Len," she whispered, pulling at his arm, "I love all these people; I love England."
"They're all right," he assented; "I don't mind strangers, but I hate the thought of all the relatives we've got to face when we get back. There'll be Aunt Hortense and Uncle Charles. Mater'll have all the uncles and the cousins and the aunts in to bid me a tender farewell. Think of spending my last evening with you answering questions about how deep the mud is in the trenches, and what we get to eat, and what the names of all the officers in my mess are."