rrow.

In the meantime Geoffrey Annersley had heard enough to want to know a
great deal more and thought he might as well make some inquiries on his
own. He wanted to find out who these American Holidays were, one of whom
had apparently saved his cousin Elinor's life and all of whom had, one
concluded, been amazingly kind to her though the blue-eyed boy had
gracefully made light of that side of the thing in the brief synopsis of
events he had had time to give to the Englishman. The captain had taken a
fancy to the narrator and was not averse to beginning his investigation
as to the Holiday family with the young corporal himself.

Accordingly he tackled the boy's commanding officer, a young colonel with
whom he chanced to be dining. The colonel was willing to talk and
Geoffrey Annersley discovered that young Holiday was rather by way of
being a top-notcher. He had enlisted as a private only a short time ago
but had been shot speedily into his corporalship. Time pressed. Officers
were needed. The boy was officer stuff. He wouldn't stay a corporal. If
all went well he would go over as a sergeant.

"We put him through though, just at first handled him rather nasty," the
colonel admitted with a reminiscent twinkle. "We do put the Americans
through somehow, though it isn't that we have any grudge against 'em. We
haven't. We like 'em--most of 'em and we have to admit it's rather decent
of them to be here at all when they don't have to. All the same we give
'em an extra twist of the discipline crank on general principles just to
see what they are made of. We found out mighty quick with this youngster.
He took it all and came back for more with a 'sir,' and a salute and a
devilish debonair, you-can't-down-me kind of grin that would have
disarmed a Turk."

"He doesn't look precisely meek to me," Annersley had said remembering
the answering flash he had caught in those blue eyes when he was begging
the boys to get in an extra lick against the Huns for his sake.

"Meek nothing! He has more spirit than any cub we've had to get into
shape this many a moon. It isn't that. It is just that he has the right
idea, had it from the start however he came by it. You know what it is,
captain. It is obedience, first, last and all the time, the will to be
willed. A soldier's job is to do what he is told whether he likes it or
not, whether it is his job or not, whether it makes sense or not, whether
he gets his orders from a man he looks up t