CHAPTER VII
PETER WRITES A LETTER
IN March, 1916, Sergt. Peter Starkley got back to his own country,bigger in the chest and an inch taller than when he had gone away. Hewalked a little stiffly on his right foot, it is true--but what did thatmatter? His letters to the people at home had, by intention, given themonly a vague idea of the possible date of his arrival. They knew that hewas coming, that he was well, and that his new leg was such amasterpiece of construction that he had danced on it in London on twooccasions. Otherwise he was unannounced.
He went to the town of Stanley first and left his baggage in the freightshed at the siding. With his haversack on his shoulder and a stout stickin his right hand, he set out along the white and slippery road. Beforehe got to the bridge a two-horse sled overtook him, and the driver, anelderly man whom he did not know, invited him to climb on. Peteraccepted the invitation with all the agility at his command.
"You step a mite lame on your right leg," said the driver.
"That's so," replied Peter, smiling.
"Been soldierin', hey? See any fight-in'?"
"Yes, I've been in Flanders."
"That so? I've got a boy in the war. Smart boy, too. They give him a jobright in England. He wears spurs to his boots, he does; and it ain'teveryone kin wear them spurs, he writes me. This here war ain't all inFlanders. We had some shootin' round here about a year back out Pike'sSettlement way. A young feller in soldier uniform was drivin' along, andsome one shot at him from the woods. That's what _he_ said, but myboy--that was afore he went to the war--says like enough he shot himselfso's to git out of goin'. He's a smart lad--that's why they give him ajob in England. Army Service Corps, he is--so I reckon maybe he's rightabout that feller shootin' himself."
"What's his name?" asked Peter quietly.
"Starkley. Peter Starkley from Beaver Dam."
"I'm asking the name of that smart son of yours."
"Gus Todder's his name--Gus Todder, junior. Maybe you know him," was thereply.
"No, but I've got his number," said Peter. "You tell him so in the nextletter you write him. Tell him that Sergt. Peter Starkley of the 26thCanadian Infantry Battalion will be glad to see him when he comes home;tell him not to cut himself on those spurs of his in the meantime; andyou'd better advise him to warn _his father_ not to shoot his mouth offin future to military men about things he is ignorant of. Here's where Iget off. Thanks for the lift."
Peter left the sled, but turned at the other's voice and stood lookingback at him.
"I didn't get the hang of all that you was sayin'," said Todder. He wasplainly disconcerted.
"Never mind; your son will catch the drift of it," replied Peter. "I amtoo happy about getting home to be fussy about little things, but don'tchat quite so freely with every returned infantryman you see about yourson's smartness. You call it smartness--but the fellows up where I leftmy right leg have another name for it."
Opening the white gate, he went up the deep and narrow path between snowbanks to the white house. At the top of the short flight of steps thatled to the winter porch that inclosed the front door, he looked over hisshoulder and saw Todder still staring at him. Peter grinned and wavedhis hand, then opened the door of the porch.
As he closed the door behind him, the house door opened wide before him.Vivia stood on the threshold. She stared at him with her eyes very roundand her lips parted, but she did not move or speak. She held her slimhands clasped before her--clasped so tight that the knuckles werecolorless. Her small face, which had been as pale as her clasped handsat the first glimpse, turned suddenly as red as a rose; and her eyes,which had been very bright even to their wonderful depths, were dimmedsuddenly with a shimmer of tears. And for a long time--for ten fullseconds, it may have been--Peter also stood motionless and stared. Theheavy stick slipped from his fingers and fell with a clatter on thefloor of the porch. He stepped forward then and enfolded her in hiskhaki-clad arms, safe and sure against the big brass buttons of hisgreatcoat; and just then the door of the porch opened, and Mr. Toddersaid:
"I ain't got the hang of yer remarks yet, young feller."
"Chase yourself away home," replied Peter, without turning his head; andthere was something in the tone of his voice that caused Mr. Todder towithdraw his head from the porch and to retire, muttering, to his sled.Vivia had not paid the slightest heed to the interruption. She drewPeter into the hall.
"I was afraid," she whispered. "I didn't know how much they had hurtyou, Peter--but I wasn't afraid of that. I should love you just as muchif they had crippled you,--I am so selfish in my love, Peter,--but I wasafraid, at first, that I might see a change in your eyes."
"There couldn't be a change in my eyes when I look at you, unless I wereblind," said Peter. "Even if I were blind, I guess I could see you. ButI am the same as I was, inside and out--all except a bit of a patentleg."
Just then Mrs. Hammond made her discreet appearance, expressed her joyand surprise at the sight of Peter and ventured a motherly kiss. Mr.Hammond came in from the store half an hour later and welcomed Petercordially. The man had lost weight, and his face was grim. He got Peterto himself for a few minutes just before supper.
"Jim is still on the other side the border somewhere, I guess," he said,"though I haven't heard from him for months. I've kept the shootingbusiness quiet, Peter--and even about his deserting; but I had to tellhis mother and Vivia that he wasn't any good as a soldier and had goneaway. I made up some kind of story about it. Other people think he's inFrance, I guess--even your folks at Beaver Dam. But what do you hear ofPat? He isn't much of a hand at writing letters, but was well when hewrote last to his mother."
"I didn't see him over there, but Henry ran across him and said that heis doing fine work. He's got his third pip and is attached toheadquarters of one of the brigades of the First Division as a learner.He has been wounded once, I believe, but very slightly."
"And I used to think that Pat wasn't much good--too easy-going andloose-footed," said Mr. Hammond bitterly. "My idea of a man was astorekeeper. Well, I think of him now, and I stick out my chest--andthen I remember Jim, and my chest caves in again."
They were interrupted then by Vivia; so nothing more was said about thedeserter. After supper Peter had to prove to the family that he coulddance on his new leg.
"I'll hitch the grays to the pung," said Mr. Hammond when about eighto'clock Peter got ready to go. "It's a fine night, and the roads are amarvel. I'll drive you home."
"And I am going too," said Vivia.
Dry maple sticks burned on the hearth of the big Franklin stove in thesitting room of Beaver Dam. Flora sat at the big table writing a letterto Dick; John Starkley and Jim Hammond played checkers; and Mrs.Starkley nodded in a chair by the fire. Emma had gone to bed. JohnStarkley had his hand raised and hovering for a master move when ajangle of bells burst suddenly upon their ears. Flora darted to awindow, and the farmer hastened to the front door; but by the time Florahad drawn back the curtains and her father had opened the door JimHammond was upstairs and in his room.
Jim did not light the candle that stood on the window sill at the headof his bed. He closed the door behind him. The blind was up; starshinefrom the world of white and purple and silver without sifted faintlyinto the little room. He stood for a minute in the middle of the floor,listening to the broken and muffled sounds of talk and laughter from thelower hall. He heard a trill of Vivia's laughter. What had brought Viviaout again, he wondered. News of Peter, beyond a doubt; and good news, tojudge by the sounds. He seated himself cautiously on the edge of thebed.
Now he heard his father's voice. Yes--and John Starkley was laughing.There was another man's voice, but he could hear only a low note of itnow and then in the confused, happy babble of sound. A door shut--andthen he could not hear anything. He wondered who the third man was anddecided that he probably was some one from the village who had justarrived home and who had brought messages from Peter. Perhaps, he
thought, Peter was even then on his way from England.
Jim sat there with the faint shine of the stars falling soft on the ragcarpet at his feet and thought what wonderful people the Starkleys were.They had taken him in and treated him like one of the family--and like awhite man. Now that Peter was coming home and would be able to help withthe work, he would go away and show John Starkley that he had found hiscourage and his manhood. He had made his plans in a general way weeksbefore. He would go to another province and enlist in the artillery orin the infantry under an assumed name; if he "made good," or got killed,John Starkley would tell all the good he could of him to his family inStanley. Already he felt lonely, a dreary chill of homesickness, at thethought of leaving Beaver Dam.
A door opened and closed downstairs, but Jim Hammond was too busy withhis thoughts and high resolves to hear the faint sounds. He even did nothear the feet on the carpeted stairs--and a hand was on the latch of thedoor before he knew that some one was about to enter the room. He satrigid and stared at the door.
The door opened and some one entered who bulked large and tall in thepale half gloom of the room. The visitor halted and turned his facetoward the bed.
"Who's there?" he asked; and Jim could see the shoulders lower andadvance a little and the whole figure become tense as if for attack.
"It's me, Peter!" whispered Jim sharply "Shut the door quick!"
"You! You, Jim Hammond!" said Peter in a voice of amazement and anger."What the mischief are you doing here?" Without turning his face fromthe bed he shut the door behind him with his heel. "Light the candle andpull down the shade. Let me see you."
Jim got to his feet and reached for the shade, but Peter spoke before hetouched it.
"No! The candle first!" exclaimed Peter, with an edge to his voice. "Idon't trust you in the dark any more than I trust you in the woods."
Hammond struck a match and lit the candle, then drew down the shade andturned with his back to the window. His face was pale. "I didn't figureon your getting home so soon," he said in an unsteady voice. "I didn'tintend to be here. I thought I'd be gone before you came."
"What are you doing here, anyway?" demanded Peter. "What's the game?Sitting in my room, on my bed, quite at home, by thunder! And yourfather thinks you are in the States. Does my father know you are here?"
Jim smiled faintly. "Yes, he knows--and all your folks know. I've beenhere since about the middle of October, working, and sleeping in thisroom every night. My people don't know where I am--but when I get toFrance you can tell them. Your father doesn't know that it was I whofired that shot--and when I found you hadn't told him that, or even thatI was a deserter, I felt it was up to me to do my best for you while youwere away. So I've worked hard and been happy here; and I'll be sorry togo away--but I must go now that you're home again. Don't tell my peopleI'm here, Peter."
"You have been living here ever since the middle of October, workinghere, and your own father and mother don't know where you are?"
"Your people are the only ones who know."
Peter eyed him in silence for a minute.
"Why did you shoot me, Jim?" he asked more gently.
"How do I know?" exclaimed Hammond. "I was drinking; I was just aboutmad with drink. I liked you well enough, Peter,--I didn't want to killyou,--but the devil was in me. It was drink made me act so bad in St.John; it was drink made me desert; it was drink that came near making amurderer of me. That's the truth, Peter--and now I wish you'd godownstairs, for I don't want my father or Vivia to find me here--or toknow anything about me till I'm in France."
"Shall I find you here when I come back?" asked Peter.
"I'll come downstairs as soon as they go," said Hammond.
Peter was about to leave the room when he suddenly remembered the errandthat had brought him away from the company downstairs. It was aphotograph of himself taken at the age of five years. Vivia had heard ofit and asked for it; and before either of his parents or Flora had beenable to think of a way of stopping him he had started upstairs for it.Now he found it on the top of a shelf of old books and wiped off thedust on his sleeve.
"Vivia wants it," he said, smiling self-consciously.
He found Flora waiting at the head of the stairs for him.
"It's all right; I've had a talk with him," he whispered, and when hereached the sitting room he met the anxious glances of his parents witha smile and nod that set their immediate anxieties at rest.
It was past midnight when Vivia and her father drove away. Then Jim camedownstairs, and Peter shook hands with him in the most natural way inthe world.
"When we met in my bedroom we were both too astonished to shake hands,"explained Peter.
"You must sleep in Dick's room now, Peter," said Mrs. Starkley.
"Only for one night," said Jim, trying to smile but making a poor job ofit. "I'll be off to-morrow, now that Peter is home again--just as Iplanned all along, you know. I--it isn't the going back to the army Imind; it is--leaving you people."
He smiled more desperately than ever.
Mrs. Starkley and Flora did not dare trust their voices to reply. JohnStarkley laid a hand on Jim's shoulder and said, "Go when it suits you,Jim, and come back when it suits you--and we shall miss you when you areaway, remember that."
The three men sat up for another hour, talking of Peter's experiencesand Jim's plans. They went upstairs at last, but even then neither Peternor Jim could sleep, for the one was restless with happiness and theother with the excitement of impending change. Peter would see Vivia onthe morrow, and Jim would meet strange faces. Peter had returned to thesecurity that he had fought and shed his blood for and to the life andpeople he loved; Jim's fighting was all before him, and behind him adisgrace to be outlived.
After a while Peter got up and went to Jim's room in his pyjamas; he saton the edge of Jim's bed, and they talked of the fighting over inFrance.
"I've been thinking about my reenlistment," said Jim, "and I guess I'lltake a chance on my own name. It's my name I want to make good."
"Sounds risky--but I don't believe it is as risky as it sounds," saidPeter.
"Not if I go far enough away to enlist--to Halifax or Toronto. Theremust be lots of Hammonds in the army. I'll take the risk, anyway. Itisn't likely I'll run across any of the old crowd. None of our oldofficers would be hard on me, I guess, if they found me fighting anddoing my duty."
"Capt. Long is dead. A great many of the old crowd are dead, and othershave been promoted out of the regiment. Remember Dave Hammer?"
"Yes. If I could ever be as good a soldier as Dave Hammer I think I'dforget--except sometimes in the middle of the night, maybe--what a mean,worthless fellow I have been."
"I'll tell you what, Jim," said Peter suddenly, "I'll write a letter foryou to carry; and if any one spots you over there and is nasty about it,you go to any officer you know in the old battalion and tell the truthand show my letter. I guess that will clear your name, Jim, if you doyour duty."
"You don't mean to put _everything_ in the letter, do you?"
"Only what is known officially--that you went home from your regimenthere in Canada on pass, started acting the fool and deserted. That isthe charge against you, Jim--desertion. But it is the mildest sort ofdesertion, and reenlistment just about offsets it. The same thing donein France in the face of the enemy is punished--you know how."
"Yes, I know how it is punished," said Hammond. "You wouldn't worryabout that if you knew as much about how I feel now as I do myself. Ofcourse I've got to prove it before you'll believe it, Peter, but I'm notafraid to fight."
When Peter had gone back to his room, he sat down to write the letterthat Jim Hammond was to carry in his pocket. It was a long letter, andPeter was a slow writer. He spared no pains in making every point of hisargument perfectly clear. He staked the military reputation of the wholeStarkley family on James Hammond's future behavior as a soldier. Hesealed it with red wax and his great-grandfather's seal and addressedthe envelope to "Any Officer of the 26th Can. Inf
ty. Bn. or of any Unitof the Can. Army Corps of the B. E. F." When finally he had the letterdone, it was morning.