“Is that you, Dale?” he asked, and his voice was eager.
“Yes, David.” Her heart was singing that he had called her so early before there was anyone around to listen.
“Well, my orders have come. Are you busy today? Can you meet me at the station when my train gets in, and can we have the day together?”
“Today?” she said joyously. “Why yes, today, of course. What time does your train get in? Eleven o’clock? Yes, I can make it. And what time do you have to leave tonight? Ten? Yes, I can do it. I’ll be there by the train gate. And if by any chance you can’t find me, go to the traveler’s aid desk and wait for me. But I’ll be there. Good-bye.”
Chapter 8
With a radiant face, Dale sat down to plan her day. She must make out the best menus she possibly could for her time of absence. There was no point in making Hattie endure the grim remarks of the relatives, which would, of course, be directed against Hattie in her absence, as if Hattie had perpetrated the whole idea. What could she have? An omelet for breakfast, jelly omelet? That was one of Hattie’s great dishes. Dry cereal, orange juice, and raisins. For lunch, some of Hattie’s delectable rice pancakes with honey; for dinner, fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and an apple pudding. That ought to be a good enough dinner for anybody, and they couldn’t complain that she had run away for the day and left them without enough food.
She would start right away. She would get the chickens and anything else necessary, and hire the little Talbut boy to bring them so that she could go into the city and not have to return and explain where she was going or how long she was staying.
She went down and told Hattie what she was having for the meals. She told Hattie a friend who was passing through the city had called and asked her to come down and stay for lunch and maybe dinner. She would be back in the evening sometime. Would Hattie carry on?
Hattie’s face shone with willingness.
“Sure thing, Miss Dale, I’ll carry on. And I don’t know one thing about where you is goin’ or what you is doin’. Don’t you tell me neither, and then those nosey people can’t get nothin’ outta me. I’m so glad you is gettin’ some rest. I hopes you have a good time. Your grandma would just like that, and I hope you get all that’s comin’ to you. Them relatives, they is just too snooty and disagreeable, and there’s no reason why you should have to dance ‘tendance on them every minute. Now you just set down and eat a good breakfast, and then go get yourself all prettied up, and go off before they gets here. Then they can’t get up any hindrances, for I’m just sure they would if they knowed about it. They is just folks that don’t want no other folks to have a good time.”
So with Hattie’s help, Dale was fed, got herself dressed up, wrote menus for the day, and departed out the back door and down the backstreet before her guests arrived for their breakfast.
Hattie had agreed to explain to the aunt about her sudden telephone call, so Dale went off with all her burdens laid aside for the time being and her heart ready to take in the joy of a day’s pleasant companionship.
Not until she was seated in the bus on the way to the city, with the hometown in the background and the day before her, did she let herself think much about what the day was to bring. Then she found herself visualizing the young officer and her heart quickening over the memory of his pleasant face. Would he look as handsome to her when she met him as he had when she had first seen him? Of course he would. How silly! But still, the other recent encounters with him had been so brief and so filled with cares and duties that she had scarcely had time to study him or really to know how he did look. However, she was sure she would know him, even if he came in company with a lot of other servicemen.
It was funny to her, Dale Huntley, who had never had much time to accept attention from men, to be going out to meet a young man whom she would have all to herself for the rest of the day. Would she be able to make it interesting for him all that time? Wouldn’t he soon get bored and wish he hadn’t asked her to meet him? Wish he had merely called, so he could go away at any time if his interest flagged? Well, he hadn’t, and so it was up to her to make the day interesting for him. And how should she do that?
Should she plan to take him to see the notable places in the city? Would he like that? The museums, the historic buildings?
But it was silly to try to plan until he came. He would likely know what he wanted to do, and he should be the one to choose.
Dale looked very pretty that morning. The cares and annoyances that had been with her ever since her grandmother’s death were lifted from her for the time being, and she was going out to be a real girl and just have a nice time. Grandmother would have loved that for her. Dale wondered briefly if Grandmother was where she could see her and be pleased about her day.
She was wearing a simple cotton dress of blue with white printed flowers in a delicate design and a plain, little white sailor hat, not new enough to be exactly stylish but very attractive. She had always liked it and felt at home in it. Its band was a simple black velvet ribbon tied in a neat bow a little to one side on the front. There was a soft pink flush of excitement on her cheeks, her eyes were starry, a sweet smile was on her lovely lips. More than one fellow traveler in the bus looked at her with admiration, and looked again because she made a pleasant picture and was very lovely. Dale would have been amazed if anyone had told her that she was. Perhaps that was what gave the perfect touch to her loveliness, that she was utterly unaware of her own beauty. But with that bright anticipation in her eyes she was really very beautiful.
Then suddenly they were at the station, and she saw by the clock on the tower of the station that it was almost time for her navy friend’s train to arrive.
She got out and hurried up to the train floor, searching out the right gate, making sure by reading the sign over the gate, asking a question of the gateman. She found that the train was on time, and though the clock on the wall said it would be there in just two minutes, those two minutes seemed each an hour long.
It was coming! She could see it down the track, a mere speck in the distance, rushing toward her. Then it had arrived, and she stood behind the gate, watching as the passengers poured from the train and crowded up to the gates.
Dale studied each face as the uniformed men came up, but none of them was the right one, and her heart began to sink. Now the crowd was thinning; most of the passengers had entered the gates and gone on into the city. There was just one man down the length of the train, talking to a redcap, handing over some baggage, and paying some money. Could that be David? And if it was, what was he doing? And now the redcap was running toward the gate, carrying some bags, and dashing over to the checkroom. Her quick mind grasped the idea at once, and she looked back at the man. Yes, that was David. Her heart thrilled at his fine bearing, his brisk military walk. He was coming to her. He had gotten rid of his baggage for the day so that he would be free to go with her!
Her face was beaming, radiant; there was a banner of welcome in her eyes as she stood there behind the gate and looked out, and David saw her and came forward. How beautiful she was! How had he dared call her up and make a date with her?
He came to her quickly and swung inside the gate, came and took both the hands she held out to him with his own, warmly clasped, and drew her aside by the gate entrance where a few stragglers were still coming through. He held her hands an instant and looked down into her eyes, and the look he gave her set her heart to thrilling and brought the color sweetly into her cheeks.
They almost forgot that there were other people around and that some of them might be watching, for each was so engaged in reading the look in the other’s eyes. But just then a group of people rushing to catch another train came bumping and elbowing by, and they had to draw farther aside. But David did not let go of the hands he was holding. He drew one of them up through his arm, and laid his other hand on the soft little hand that almost seemed to nestle on his arm. Was he imagining all this, or did she really feel as he did? He looked down
at her sweet, shy face, but it was a glad look she wore. She was not annoyed, nor embarrassed. Just a great gladness seemed to envelope her, and he knew he mustn’t let her know what he was reading in her eyes, not yet, anyway. Perhaps she wasn’t conscious yet of her own reaction to his touch. Bless her! And he mustn’t startle her with it. He mustn’t run any risk of losing even a fraction of this wonderful thing that had come to be between them.
But both these young people were trained to be ready in all situations, and so it was scarcely a minute before they came to themselves and realized that they were in the way of a lot of hurrying people and must get out of it.
David smiled down into her eyes and kept his hand closed over the hand on his arm. “Come!” he said and led her across into the main station room and to the elevators. As they went slowly down, his eyes were upon hers, their glances locked in a look of delight, as if each glance were a new discovery to the other.
The elevator came to a stop, and they went out with the other passengers.
“This way,” said David.
Dale smiled and turned her footsteps as he led. “Where we going?” she asked, like a pleased child in a dream.
“Do you care?” he asked, smiling. “Had you someplace you wanted to go?”
“Oh no,” said Dale. “I wasn’t sure just what you were planning to do, or where you would want to go.”
“Then that’s all right,” said the young man. “The last time I was in this city I picked out a place where I would like to take you if I ever got the opportunity, and now we’ll have a try at it. If you don’t like it, we needn’t stay there. We can easily go somewhere else later. In fact, we probably will, later. But—do you like the woods?”
“Oh, I do!” said Dale with happy eyes. “I used to think a day in the woods was the next thing to heaven when I was a little girl. And after all I’ve been through, this is going to be wonderful!”
“I’m glad of that,” he said, pressing her fingers under his hand. “Here! Here is a taxi.” He helped her in, explained to the driver where he wished to go, sat down beside her, and they were soon on their way. But the young man lost no time in quietly possessing himself of her hand again.
It seemed amazing to Dale that just a quiet handclasp could become such a wonderful thing, going to the heart of her being and bringing her closer to this almost stranger than she had ever imagined anyone could be to another.
She found her own fingers clinging to his hand and caught her breath at herself. Yet it seemed so right. Was she in a dream, and would she soon wake up and find it all had not happened? Could she be losing her head?
They whirled through the soft greenness of the park—tall trees arching overhead, wide drives and banks of shrubbery on every side, breath of the sweet out-of-doors wafting in at the open window, here and there a little cottage with some historical legend painted on a board at the side, beds of fall flowers, glimpses of the sky above, arches of a large bridge spanning overhead. It was like going into a new world. And David knew a lot about all these places. He had purposely come here on his last trip to find out about it, so that it might be of interest to them both. He was telling her now what he knew with animated words, but his hand was still warm around her own, and his eyes were telling pleasant, friendly, happy thoughts to her heart. She couldn’t quite place herself in all this delight. It wasn’t anything she could withdraw herself from, as her dignified life training would have admonished her at another time to do. This was a real friend, telling her good things, in a gentle, friendly way. A Christian young man. Couldn’t she trust herself to be happy over it?
They climbed a hill now and dismissed the taxi, and then they turned into the deeper, higher woods until they came to a pleasant sheltered clearing where they could look out over the far world that seemed so distant and yet was so near that Dale drew her breath in delight.
They stood together for a moment, looking out across the world, David still holding Dale’s hand, quietly, warmly, as if it belonged there, and then he turned and looked down at her, straight into her beautiful eyes that were looking so earnestly, so questioningly up into his, and it suddenly seemed as if their whole brief acquaintance was climaxed in that wonderful moment. David’s other hand slipped out almost reverently toward her, as he bent his head and drew her close within his arms.
“Dale!” he breathed softly, in almost a whisper. “Dale! My darling! I love you! I love you with my whole heart! I’ve loved you since I first saw you. And because we’ve had so little time to get acquainted and I have to go away so soon, I’ve brought you here to this lovely spot so near to heaven to tell you about it. I pray that God will help you to forgive me for being so abrupt about this. But Dale, darling, I love you.”
Then he drew her reverently closer and bent and laid his lips upon her own.
There swept over Dale such joy as she had never dreamed could come to a girl on this earth as she surrendered herself to his embrace, and her soft lips answered his caress.
They soon came to themselves, and he drew her down to sit beside him on the broad, pleasant bench that was placed comfortably behind some young hemlocks. His arms were around her, and he gently put her dear head down on his shoulder.
“Have I rushed you too much, my dear?” he asked tenderly. “I know it’s a very short time to get you used to such a great love as I want to give to you before I go away, but this was all the time I had, and there hasn’t seemed any other way. I love you, and when I come back I want to make you my wife—that is, if you’re willing to wait for me. To take a chance that I will live to come back. Am I being too presumptuous to dare to hope you could love me?”
Dale nestled her head closer on his shoulder and her hands in his clasp. “Oh, I do love you,” she murmured. “It doesn’t take time to love.”
“Dearest,” he breathed, “perhaps that is true. As soon as I saw you, I loved you. The first time I looked at you, I said to myself, ‘That is the kind of girl I would like to marry. How can I get to know her? When will there be time to win her? If I go back overseas will there ever come a time for me to be with her? How can she be willing to trust me?’”
“Trust you?” said Dale. “Oh, I trusted you the minute I saw you. But I never dreamed that you would ever love me.”
“And I haven’t even asked you the question that I have been so afraid to ask. Is there someone else in your life that you love? Someone who loves you and has a right to your love? I should have asked you that first.”
“Someone else!” laughed Dale, with a sweet little ripple of amusement as she looked up into his face. “Why no! Don’t you know I’ve never had time to love anybody? I’ve never had much time to know boys and go out very often. I was in school, of course, and then there was Grandmother. She began to fail, and I had to be with her whenever I could. I loved Grandmother, you know. But oh, she would have loved you, and she would be so glad to have me love you, glad to know you love me. I think perhaps God will let her know about us.”
Then he drew her closer within his arms again, and they sat quietly listening to the sweet fall sounds of nature. A few birds calling, some purple grackles crying to one another, a rusty-throated cricket rasping sharply in the thicket below them. And every sound seemed to be counting to the moments that were so precious, the moments that they still had together.
But they lived hours during those carefully dealt-out minutes. They touched on many things in their past lives, and the hours chimed dimly from some distant city tower.
And at each hour, realization would come, their hands would clasp closer and their glances would clash sadly.
And then when the distant clock struck a solemn one o’clock, David looked up suddenly and grinned at Dale. “It’s time for mess,” he said brightly. “Aren’t you hungry?”
“Oh, I never realized,” said Dale. “It’s been so wonderful to be with you!”
“You sweetheart!” said David with one of his gentle looks that made Dale feel so protected and beloved.
&
nbsp; “But I should have brought a lunch along,” she said, appalled. “I never thought. I lost my head. I was so engaged in planning menus for my relative guests, so I could get away before they came to breakfast. So they wouldn’t know where I had gone. And it never occurred to me I had a social obligation to us. If I had only known you were coming to a wonderful place like this!”
“Ah, but this was my party,” said David. “You see, I invited you, so the social part was entirely up to me.”
“But you had no way to get ready a lunch,” said Dale. “A base wouldn’t have facilities.”
“Wouldn’t they?” David said, grinning. “But, you see, I had other facilities besides. Wait till you see.” He reached over to the end of the bench where he had parked his overcoat and pulled out packages from its ample pockets. “What do you think of that? I got those sandwiches on the diner of the train coming up. I found the fruit at a station where we stopped five minutes. And this box of candy I bought in the Washington station. I found these little paper cups there, too, and I discovered the other day that there is a little spring just around the knoll below us here. Wait, I’ll bring the water while you spread out the eats.”
He was gone only a minute or two, and Dale arranged the food on the bench between them as attractively as she could. The sandwiches were in neat paper wrappings. She opened the fruit bag, and there were peaches, pears, two red apples, and two bananas. He seemed to have thought of everything. She smiled to herself in admiration of his cleverness.
Then he appeared between the trees, walking cautiously, two brimming cups of water in each hand, intense attention on his face.
“There!” he said with a relieved sigh. “I didn’t spill any of them. And now, would you like to have some lemonade?”
Reaching into his pocket, he produced a lemon and an envelope of sugar in triumph. “I saved that sugar from my coffee at the base for a week,” he said.