she could.
She was continually referring to his having been a sickly baby, and I am
quite sure she convinced herself that he had been. She spoke, too, of a
small cough he had as indicating weak lungs, and was almost indecently
irritated when the chest specialist said that it was from smoking, and
that if he had any more lung space the rest of his organs would have had
to move out.

One way and another, she kept him from enlisting for quite a time,
maintaining that to run a newspaper and keep people properly informed
was as patriotic as carrying a gun.

I remember that on one occasion, when he had at last decided to join the
navy and was going to Washington, Tish took a very bad attack of
indigestion, and nothing quieted her until after train time but to have
Charlie Sands beside her, feeding her peppermint and hot water.

Then, at last, the draft bill was passed, and she persuaded him to wait
and take his chance.

We were at a Red Cross class, being taught how to take foreign bodies
out of the ear, when the news came. Tish was not paying much attention,
because she considered that if a soldier got a bullet or shrapnel in his
ear, a syringe would not help him much. She had gone out of the room,
therefore, and Aggie had just had a bean put in her auditory canal, and
was sure it would swell before they got it again, when Tish returned.
She said the bill had passed, and that the age limit was thirty-one.

Mrs. Ostermaier, who was using the syringe, let it slip and shot a
stream of water into Aggie's right eye.

"Thirty-one!" she said. "Well, I suppose that includes your nephew, Miss
Tish."

"Not at all," said Tish. "He will have his thirty-second birthday on the
fifth of June, and he probably won't have to register at all. It's
likely to be July before they're ready."

"Oh, the fifth of June!" said Mrs. Ostermaier, and gave Aggie another
squirt.

Now Tish and I have talked this over since, and it may only be a
coincidence. But Mrs. Ostermaier's cousin is married to a Congressman
from the west, and she sends the Ostermaiers all his speeches. Mr.
Ostermaier sends on his sermon, too, in exchange, and every now and then
Mrs. Ostermaier comes running in to Tish with something delivered in our
national legislature which she claims was conceived in our pulpit.

Anyhow, when the draft day was set, _it was the fifth of June_!

Aggie and I went to Tish at once, and found her sitting very quietly
with the blinds down, a