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Miss Willmot, in the course of two years' service in the canteen of a base camp, had gained some knowledge of the soldier's heart Her inscription was calculated to make an immediate appeal. "A Merry Christmas," it ran, "And the Next in Blighty." The walls of the hut were hung round with festoons of coloured paper.
He always looks shocked when I drink four cups, so let me get through the first two before he arrives." "I wouldn't sit there if I were you," said Digby. "There's a drip coming through the roof just there which will get you on the back of the neck every time you lean forward." Miss Willmot shifted the biscuit-tin.
Miss Willmot looked up. "Is it very bad?" she asked. "One of those cases of self-wounding," said the Major. "Shot himself in the leg with his own rifle." There are cases of this kind, a few of them. Some wretch, driven half frantic by terror, worn out with hardships, hopeless of any end of his sufferings, seeks this way out. He gains a week of rest and security in a hospital ward.
The walls and floor were lined with sheets of zinc A young man stood stiffly to attention in the middle of the room. Miss Willmot stared at him. Then she turned to Sergeant O'Rorke. "Shut the door please, sergeant, and wait outside." The young man neither stirred nor spoke. "Tommy!" said Miss Willmot. Private Collins, miss, 8th Wessex Borderers." He spoke in a tone of hard, cold fury.
Miss Willmot took the sugar from her stores as she accepted the looted cotton-wool, without troubling to search for excuse or justification. She was a lady of strong will. When she made up her mind that the Christmas decorations of her canteen were to be the best in France she was not likely to stick at trifling breaches of regulations.
And I don't see why he mightn't be here instead of stuck in that silly old hospital He's quite well. He told me so yesterday. A bullet through the calf of the leg is nothing. Major, couldn't you get them to send Tommy over to the Camp just for to-morrow?" The Major shook his head. He had every sympathy with Miss Nelly. He knew all about Tommy. So did Miss Willmot. So did Digby.
It dripped into a dozen pools on the soaking floor, it fell in drops which hissed on to the top of the stove. There was no musical instrument of any kind. The tea-tray was cleared away and laid in a corner. The Major, white-haired, lean-faced, smiling, sat on the packing-case in the middle of the room. Miss Willmot sat on her biscuit-tin near the stove.
"I'll give you his address if you like," he said to the A.P.M. "He's working on a French farm and quite happy. But I don't see that you can possibly arrest him without getting the whole medical profession on your back. They said he was dead, you see, and, as Mackintosh will tell you, they never own up to making mistakes." "Be careful, Bates," said Miss Willmot; "we don't want your neck broken."
Miss Willmot was of another mind. For her there was a law higher even than the Major's lofty code of chivalry and honour. She had pity to spare for cowards. The Major himself was not wholly consistent As he rose to leave the kitchen he spoke of the prisoner again. "He doesn't look like a man who'd do it. He looks like a gentleman. That makes it worse, of course, much worse.
A padre, fourth class, though he had once been curate of St. Ethelburga's, was a feeble person. But Miss Willmot! Miss Willmot got things done, levelled entanglements of barbed red tape, captured the trenches of official persons by virtue of a quiet persistence, and there is no denying it because the things she wanted done were generally good things. The Major opened the door of the kitchen.
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