CHAPTER XXVIII
THE WAY
Keith was still looking for "the way," when October came, bringingcrisp days and chilly winds. When not too cold, the boys still sat outof doors. When it was too cold, John McGuire did not appear at all onhis back porch, and Keith did not have the courage to make a boldadvance to the McGuire door and ask admittance. There came a day,however, when a cold east wind came up after they were wellestablished in their porch chairs for the morning. They were on theBurton porch this time, and Keith suddenly determined to take the bullby the horns.
"Brrr! but it's cold this morning," he shivered blithely. "What sayyou? Let's go in. Come on." And without waiting for acquiescence, hecaught John McGuire's arm in his own and half pulled him to his feet.Before John McGuire knew then quite what was happening, he foundhimself in the house.
"No, no!--that is, I--I think I'd better be going home," he stammered.
But Keith Burton did not seem even to hear.
"Say, just try your hand at this puzzle," he was saying gayly. "I gaveit up, and I'll bet you'll have to," he finished, thrusting apasteboard box into his visitor's hands and nicely adjudging thedistance a small table must be pushed in order to bring itconveniently in front of John McGuire's chair.
The quick tightening of John McGuire's lips and the proud lifting ofhis chin told that Keith's challenge had been accepted even before thelaconic answer came.
"Oh, you do, do you? Well, we'll see whether I'll have to give it upor not."
John McGuire loved picture puzzles, as Keith Burton well knew.
It was easy after that. Keith took it so unhesitatingly for grantedthat they were to go indoors when it was cold that John McGuire foundit difficult to object; and it was not long before the two boys weregoing back and forth between the two houses with almost as much easeas if their feet had been guided by the eye instead of by the tap of aslender stick.
John McGuire was learning a great deal from Keith these days, thoughit is doubtful if he realized it. It is doubtful, also, if he realizedhow constantly he was being made to talk of the war and of hisexperience in it. But Keith realized it. Keith was not looking for"the way" now. He believed he had found it; and there came a day whenhe deemed the time had come to try to carry it out.
They were in his own home living-room. It had been a wonderful storythat John McGuire had told that day of a daring excursion into NoMan's Land, and what came of it. Upstairs in the studio Daniel Burtonwas sitting alone, as Keith knew. Keith drew a long breath and madethe plunge. Springing to his feet he turned toward the door that ledinto the hall.
"McGuire, that was a bully story--a corking good story. I want dad tohear it. Wait, I'll get him." And he was out of the room with the doorfast closed behind him before John McGuire could so much as draw abreath.
Upstairs, Daniel Burton, already in the secret, heard Keith's eagersummons and came at once. For some days he had been expecting justsuch an urgent call from Keith's lips. He knew too much to delay. Hewas down the stairs and at Keith's side in an incredibly short time.Then together they pushed open the door and entered the living-room.
John McGuire was on his feet. Very plainly he was intending to gohome, and at once. But Daniel Burton paid no attention to that. Hecame straight toward him and took his hand.
"I call this mighty good of you, McGuire," he said. "My boy here hasbeen raving about your stories of the war until I'm fairly green withenvy. Now I'm to hear a bit of them myself, he says. I wish you wouldtell me some of your experiences, my lad. You know a chance like thisis a real god-send to us poor stay-at-homes. Now fire away! I'mready."
But John McGuire was not ready. True, he sat down--but not until aftera confused "No, no, I must go home--that is, really, they're not worthrepeating--those stories." And he would not talk at all--at first.
Daniel Burton talked, however. He talked of wars in general and of theCivil War in particular; and he told the stories of Antietam andGettysburg as they had been told to him by his father. Then fromGettysburg he jumped to Flanders, and talked of aeroplanes, andgas-masks, and tanks, and trenches, and dugouts.
Little by little then John McGuire began to talk--sometimes a wholesentence, sometimes only a word or two. But there was no fire, noenthusiasm, no impetuous rush of words that brought the very din ofbattle to their ears. And not once did Daniel Burton thrust hisfingers into his pocket for his pencil and notebook. Yet, when it wasall over, and John McGuire had gone home, Keith dropped into his chairwith a happy sigh.
"It wasn't much, dad, I know," he admitted, "but it was something. Itwas a beginning, and a beginning is something--with John McGuire."
And it was something; for the next time Daniel Burton entered theroom, John McGuire did not even start from his chair. He gave a faintsmile of welcome, too, and he talked sooner, and talked more--thoughthere was little of war talk; and for the second time Daniel Burtondid not reach for his pencil.
But the third time he did. A question, a comment, a chance word--neitherKeith nor his father could have told afterward what startedit. They knew only that a sudden light as of a flame leaped into JohnMcGuire's face--and he was back in the trenches of France and carryingthem with him.
At the second sentence Daniel Burton's fingers were in his pocket, andat the third his pencil was racing over the paper at breakneck speed.There was no pause then, no time for thought, no time for carefulforming of words and letters. There was only the breakneck racebetween a bit of lead and an impassioned tongue; and when it was allover, there were only a well-nigh hopeless-looking mass ofhieroglyphics in Daniel Burton's notebook--and the sweat of spentexcitement on the brows of two youths and a man.
"Gee! we got it that time!" breathed Keith, after John McGuire hadgone home.
"Yes; only I was wondering if I had really--got it," murmured DanielBurton, eyeing a bit ruefully the confused mass of words and lettersin his notebook. "Still, I reckon I can dig it out all right--if I doit right away," he finished confidently. And he did dig it out beforehe slept that night.
If Daniel Burton and his son Keith thought the thing was done, and itwas going to be easy sailing thereafter, they found themselves greatlymistaken. John McGuire scarcely said five sentences about the war thenext time they were together, though Daniel Burton had his pencilpoised expectantly from the start. He said only a little more the nexttime, and the next; and Daniel Burton pocketed his pencil in despair.Then came a day when a chance word about a new air raid reported inthe morning paper acted like a match to gunpowder, and sent JohnMcGuire off into a rapid-fire story that whipped Daniel Burton'spencil from his pocket and set it to racing again at breakneck speedto keep up with him.
It was easier after that. Still, every day it was like a game ofhide-and-seek, with Daniel Burton and his pencil ever in pursuit, andwith now and then a casual comment or a tactful question to lure thehiding story out into the open. Little by little, as the frankcomradeship of Daniel Burton won its way, John McGuire was led to talkmore and more freely; and by Christmas the eager scribe was inpossession of a very complete record of John McGuire's war experiences,dating even from the early days of his enlistment.
Day by day, as he had taken down the rough notes, Daniel Burton hadfollowed it up with a careful untangling and copying before he had hada chance to forget, or to lose the wonderful glow born of theimpassioned telling. Then, from time to time he had sorted the notesand arranged them in proper sequence, until now he had a completestory, logical and well-rounded.
It was on Christmas Day that he read the manuscript to Keith. At itsconclusion Keith drew a long, tremulous breath.
"Dad, it's wonderful!" he exclaimed. "How did you do it?"
"You know. You heard yourself."
"Yes; but to copy it like that--! Why, I could hear him tell it as youread it, dad. I could HEAR him."
"Could you, really? I'm glad. That makes me know I've succeeded. Nowfor a publisher!"
"You wouldn't publish it without his--knowing?"
"Certainly not. But
I'm going to let a publisher see it, before heknows."
"Y-yes, perhaps."
"Why, Keith, I'd have to do that. Do you suppose I'd run the risk ofits being turned down, and then have to tell that boy that he couldn'thave the book, after all?"
"No, no, I suppose not. But--it isn't going to be turned down, dad.Such a wonderful thing can't be turned down."
"Hm-m; perhaps not." Daniel Burton's lips came together a bit grimly."But--there ARE wonderful things that won't sell, you know. However,"he finished with brisk cheerfulness, "this isn't one of my pictures,nor a bit of Susan's free verse; so there's some hope, I guess.Anyhow, we'll see--but we won't tell John until we do see."
"All right. I suppose that would be best," sighed Keith, still alittle doubtfully.
They had not long to wait, after all. In a remarkably short time cameback word from the publishers. Most emphatically they wanted the book,and they wanted it right away. Moreover, the royalty they offered wasso good that it sent Daniel Burton down the stairs two steps at a timelike a boy, in his eagerness to reach Keith with the good news.
"And now for John!" he cried excitedly, as soon as Keith's joyousexclamations over the news were uttered. "Come, let's go across now."
"But, dad, how--how are you going to tell him?" Keith was holding backa little.
"Tell him! I'm just going to tell him," laughed the man. "That'seasy."
"I know; but--but----" Keith wet his lips and started again. "You see,dad, he didn't know we were taking notes of his stories. He couldn'tsee us. We--we took advantage of----"
But Daniel Burton would not even listen.
"Shucks and nonsense, Keith!" he cried. Then a little grimly he added:"I only wish somebody'd take advantage like that of me, and sell apicture or two when I'm not looking. Come, we're keeping Johnwaiting." And he took firm hold of his son's arm.
Yet in the McGuire living-room, in the presence of John McGuirehimself, he talked fully five minutes of nothing in particular, beforehe said:
"Well, John, I've got some good news for you."
"GOOD news?"
"That's what I'd call it. I--er--hear you're going to have a book outin the spring."
"I'm going to--WHAT?"
"Have a book out--war stories. They were too good to keep toourselves, John, so I jotted them down as you told them, and last weekI sent them off to a publisher."
"A--a real publisher?" The boy's voice shook. Every trace of color haddrained from his face.
"You bet your life--and one of the biggest in the country." DanielBurton's own voice was shaking. He had turned his eyes away from JohnMcGuire's face.
"And they'll--print it?"
"Just as soon as ever you'll sign the contract. And, by the way, thatcontract happens to be a mighty good one, for a first book, my boy."
John McGuire drew a long breath. The color was slowly coming back tohis face.
"But I can't seem to quite--believe it," he faltered.
"Nonsense! Simplest thing in the world," insisted Daniel Burtonbrusquely. "They saw the stories, liked them, and are going to publishthem. That's all."
"All! ALL!" The blind boy was on his feet, his face working withemotion. "When all my life I've dreamed and dreamed and longed for----"He stopped short and sat down. He had the embarrassed air thehabitually reserved person usually displays when caught red-handedmaking a "scene." He gave a confused laugh. "I was only thinking--whata way. You see--I'd always wanted to be a writer, but I'd given it uplong ago. I had my living to earn, and I knew I couldn't earn it--thatway--not at first. I used to say I'd give anything if I could write abook; and I was just wondering if--if I'd been willing then to havegiven--my eyes!"