quite
as deeply moved.

It was the first time they had met since separating in Paris a month
before. And in these times of war, with peace still an uncertainty, there
were many perils to fear between the port of Brest and that of New York.

Tom, in uniform and with a ribbon and medal on his breast, grinned
teasingly at the two girls.

"Come, come! Break away! Only twenty seconds allowed in a clinch. Don't
Helen look fine, Ruth? How's the shoulder?"

"Just a bit stiff yet," replied the girl of the Red Mill, kissing her chum
again.

At this moment the first sudden swoop of the tempest arrived. The tall
elms writhed as though taken with St. Vitus's dance. The hens began to
screech and run to cover. Thunder muttered in the distance.

"Oh, dear me!" gasped Ruth, paling unwontedly, for she was not by nature
a nervous girl. "Come right into the house, Helen. You could not get to
Cheslow or back home before this storm breaks. Put your car under the
shed, Tom."

She dragged her friend into the yard and up the warped flag stones to the
side door of the cottage. A little old woman who had been sitting on the
porch in a low rocking chair arose with difficulty, leaning on a cane.

"Oh, my back, and oh, my bones!" murmured Aunt Alvirah Boggs, who was not
long out of a sick bed herself and would never again be as "spry" as she
once had been. "Do come in, dearies. It is a wind storm."

Ruth stopped to help the little old woman. She continued pale, but her
thought for Aunt Alvirah's comfort caused her to put aside her own fear.
The trio entered the house and closed the door.

In a moment there was a sharp patter against the house. The rain had begun
in big drops. The rear door was opened, and Tom, laughing and shaking the
water from his cap, dashed into the living room. He wore the insignia of a
captain under his dust-coat and the distinguishing marks of a very famous
division of the A. E. F.

"It's a buster!" he declared. "There's a paper sailing like a kite over
the roof of the old mill----"

Ruth sprang up with a shriek. She ran to the back door by which Tom had
just entered and tore it open.

"Oh, do shut the door, deary!" begged Aunt Alvirah. "That wind is 'nough
to lift the roof."

"What _is_ the matter, Ruth?" demanded Helen.

But Tom ran out after her. He saw the girl leap from the porch and run
madly down the path toward the summer-house. Back on the wind came a
broken word or two of explanation:

"My pape