Part 7

John Gayther nodded approvingly. The story of a girl was exactly what he would like to hear, provided it was told by the young lady who sat in front of him.

"She was of an independent turn of mind," said the Daughter of the House, "and there were a great many things in this world which bored her, not because they were uninteresting in themselves, but because she could not enjoy them in the way which suited her. She had thought of hundreds of things she would like to do if she only could do them in her own way and without control by other people. She was very anxious to perform deeds, noble deeds if possible, but she could not endure the everlasting control which seems to be thought necessary in this world--at least, for girls. The consequence of this was that she spent a great deal of her time in doing things which made no imprint whatever upon the progress of the world or upon the elevation of her own character.

"Now it happened that at the time of my story there was a war in the land, and a great many people with whom my heroine was acquainted went forth to do battle for their country and their principles, or to act patriotically in some other way than fighting. I forgot to say that my heroine is named Almia--"

"De Ponsett, I suppose," interrupted John Gayther. "Almia de Ponsett is the name of a beautiful new white tea-rose."

"Not at all," said the young lady, drawing her eyebrows slightly together; "there is no 'de Ponsett' about it, and her name has nothing to do with tea-roses. It is simply Almia. She grew more and more dissatisfied every day the war went on. Everybody who was worth anything was doing something, and here she was doing nothing. What was there she could do? This became the great question of her life. If I were about to write out this story I would say something here about the workings of her mind; but that is not necessary now. But her mind worked a great deal, and the end of it was that she determined to be a nurse. Nursing, indeed, is the only thing a young woman can do in a war.

"But when she began to make inquiries about army nurses--what they ought to do, how they ought to do it, and all that--she ran up against that terrible bugbear of control. Everywhere was control, control, control; and she really began to despair. There were examinations, and training, and applications to the surgeon-general, and to the assistant surgeon, and to special heads of departments and districts and States and counties, for all I know. There was positively no end to the things she would have to do to get a regular appointment to go forth and do her duty to her country. So she threw up the whole business of regular army nursing, and made up her mind to go out into the field of duty to which she had appointed herself, and do the things she ought to do in the way she thought they ought to be done. She likened herself to the knights of old who used to go forth to fight for their ladies and for the upholding of chivalry. She wanted to be a sort of a free-lance, but she did not want to hire herself to anybody. She did not fancy being anything like a guerilla, and then it suddenly struck her that if she did just as she wanted to do she would resemble a bushwhacker more than anything else. A bushwhacker is an honest man. When there is no war he whacks bushes, that is, he cuts them down; and when there is a war--"

"He whacks the enemy," suggested John Gayther.

The Daughter of the House smiled a little. "Yes," she said; "he tries to do that. But he is entirely independent; he is under nobody; and that suited Almia. A bushwhacker nurse was exactly what she wanted to be, and as soon as this was settled she made all her preparations to go to the war."

"Of course," said John Gayther, "the young lady's parents--or perhaps she did not have any parents?"

The Daughter of the House frowned. "Now, John," said she, "I don't want anything said about parents. There were no parents in this case, at least none to be considered. I don't say whether they were dead or not, but the story has nothing to do with them. Parents would be very embarrassing, and I don't want to stop to bother with them."

John Gayther nodded his head as if he thought she was quite right, and she went on:

"The first thing Almia did was to fit herself out after the fashion she thought best adapted to a bushwhacker nurse. She wore heavy boots, and a bicycle-skirt which just came to the top of the boots; and in this skirt she put ever so many pockets. She wore a little cap with a strap to go under the chin; and from her belt on the left side she hung a very little cask, which she happened to have, something like those carried by the St. Bernard dogs in Switzerland when they go to look for lost travellers; and this she filled with brandy. In her pockets she put every kind of thing that wounded men might want: adhesive plaster, raw cotton, bandages, some pieces of heavy pasteboard to make splints, needles and fine silk for sewing up cuts, and a good many other things suitable for wounded people. And in the right-hand pocket of her skirt she carried a pistol with five barrels."

"My conscience!" exclaimed John Gayther, "that was dangerous. And then, you know, nurses hardly ever carry pistols."

"But this was necessary," said she, "as you will see as the story goes on. Then, when she put on a long waterproof cloak which covered everything, she was ready to go to the war."

John Gayther looked at the Daughter of the House steadfastly and wondered if the Almia of the story had cut off her beautiful hair. He was sure she had had an abundance of light silvery-golden hair which fluffed itself all about her head under her wide hat, and it would be a sort of shock to think of its being cut off. But he asked no questions; he did not want to interrupt too much.

"Almia knew by the papers," continued the Daughter of the House, "that a great battle was expected to take place not far from a town at some distance from her home; and she went to this town by rail, carrying only a small hand-bag in addition to the things she wore under her waterproof. She took lodgings at a hotel, and, after an early breakfast the next morning, she hired a cab to take her out to the battle-field. The cabman drove her several miles into the country, but when he heard the booming of the preliminary cannon with which the battle was then opening, he refused to go any farther, and she was obliged to get out at the corner of a lane and the highroad. She paid the man his fare and gave him five dollars extra, and then she engaged him to call at that place for her at eight o'clock that evening. She was sure the battle would be over by that time, as it would be beginning to get dark. The cabman was sorry to leave her there to walk the rest of the way, but his horse was afraid of cannon, and he did not dare to go any farther.

"Almia took off her waterproof and left it in the cab, and the cabman was a good deal astonished when he saw her without it. He said he supposed she was a reporter and that the little cask was full of ink; he had driven lady reporters about before this. But Almia told him she was a nurse, and that he must not fail to call for her at the time appointed. Then he drove away; and she walked rapidly along the lane, which seemed to lead toward the battle-field. The lane soon began to curve, and she left it and walked across several fields. Soon she came to some outposts, where the sentries wanted to know where she was going. Of course the sentries behind an army are not as strict as those in front of it, and so when she informed them she was a nurse they told her how to get to the field-hospital, which was a mile or more away.

"But Almia did not intend to go to any hospital. She knew if she did she would immediately be put under orders; and now her blood was up, and she could stand no orders. She thought she perceived a faint smell of powder in the air. This made her feel wonderfully independent, and she strode onward with a light and fearless step. But when she came to a bosky copse which concealed her from the sentries, she turned away from the direction of the hospital, and pressed onward toward the point from which came the heaviest sound of cannon.

"Now you must understand, John Gayther," remarked the Daughter of the House, taking off her broad hat, that the breeze might more freely blow through the masses of her silvery-golden hair, "that when people who are really in earnest, especially people in fiction, go forth to find things they want, they generally find them. And if it is highly desirable that these things should be out of the common they are out of the common. A great deal of what happens in real life, and almost everything in literature, depends on this principle. You, of course, comprehend this, because you compose stories yourself."

"Oh, yes," said the gardener; "I comprehend it perfectly."

"I say all this on account of what is about to happen in this story, and also because I don't want you to make any objection in your mind on account of its not being exactly according to present usages. Almia was pushing steadily through the clump of bushes when she heard, not far away, the clash of arms. Greatly excited, she silently moved on, and peeping out from behind some foliage, she saw in a small open space in the woods two men engaged in single combat. How her heart did beat! She was frightened nearly to death. But she did not think of flight; her eyes were glued upon the fascinating spectacle before her. Often had she heard of two brave swordsmen fighting each other to the bitter end, and often had she dreamed of these noble contests; but her eyes were all unfamiliar with such inspiring sights. This truly was war.

"The combatants were both moderately young men, athletic and active, one with brown hair and the other with black. They had thrown aside their coats and vests, and each wore a broad leathern belt. Fiercely and swiftly their long swords clashed. Sparks flew, and the ring of the steel sounded far into the woods; but there was none to hear save Almia only, and her soul tingled with admiration and terror as the bright blades flashed against the background of semi-gloom which pervaded the woods. She scarcely breathed. Her whole soul was in her eyes."

"I have seen it there before," thought John Gayther, but he said nothing.

"Now there was a tremendous onset from each swordsman, and the ground echoed beneath their rapid footfalls as they stamped around. Then there was a lunge and a sharp nerve-tingling scrape as one blade ran along the other; and then, without a groan, down fell one of these brave warriors flat upon his back upon the grass, the wild flowers, and bits of bark. Instantly the impulses of a woman flashed through every vein and nerve of that onlooking girl. Scarcely had the tall form of the soldier touched the sod when she became a nurse. Springing out from her leafy concealment, she knelt beside the vanquished form of the fallen man. The other soldier, who was about to rest himself by leaning on his sword, sprang back; it seemed as though there had suddenly appeared before him a being from another world."

"Where they wear bicycle-skirts," thought John Gayther.

"Every trace of enthusiastic excitement had passed away from Almia, who now had something in this world to do, and who set about doing it without loss of a second. The man was only wounded, for he opened his eyes and said so, and drawing up his shirt-sleeve he showed Almia that the cut was in the lower part of his left arm. Instantly despatching the other soldier to a neighboring spring for water, she cleansed the wound, and, finding it was not very deep, she drew the edges of the cut together and held them in place with strips of adhesive plaster. When this had been done she wrapped the arm in several folds of bandage, and the man having risen to a sitting posture, she gave him a small draught of brandy from her cask.

"Almia now explained how she happened to appear upon the scene, and, addressing the wounded man, she said she hoped she could soon find some way of conveying him to a hospital. 'Hospital!' he cried, springing to his feet under the revivifying influence of the brandy. 'No hospital for me! I can walk as well as anybody. And now, sir,' he said, speaking to his former opponent, 'am I to consider myself vanquished, and am I to go with you as your prisoner?' The other regarded him without answering, and for the moment Almia, too, was lost in reflection."

At this point John Gayther, who had been in wars, began to wonder, even if soldiers in these days should engage in single combat with long swords, how one of them could be wounded in the left arm; but he did not interrupt the story.