Everyman's Land

n an all night stop at Bar-le-Duc. The town hadn't had an air raid for weeks, and it looked a port of peace. As well imagine e

rown up! But then, he wouldn't wait for birthdays. He wanted it every day for breakfast; and for tea at those grand New York hotels, where I wouldn't go without

jam. We had passed through lovely country since Chalons, decorated with beautiful tall trees, high box hedges, and distant, rolling downs golden with grain and sunlight. Also, whenever our road drew near the railway, we'd caught exciting glimpses of long trains "camouflaged" in blurry greens and blues, to hide themselves from aeroplanes. Nevertheless, Mother Beckett had begun to droop. Her blue ey

ill to Jim's mother. She cared more to see the two largest elms in France of which Jim had written, than any ruins of

er Ornain, on which the capital city of the Meuse is built. One saw the Rhine-Marne Canal, too, and the picturesque roofs

behind us. It was more like a taxi-cab than a brave, free-born automobile, but it had evidently come

f Paris, we had been in the zone de guerre, constantly stopped and stared at by sentinels. The only cars we passed, going east or west, were occupied by officers, or crowded with poilus, therefore the shab

ade out, under a thick coat of dust, that he wore khaki of some sort, and a cap of military shape which might be anything from British to Belgian. He gave a hand to a woman in the car-a woma

but suddenly he flung a glance over his shoulder, and sta

t his great dark eyes were splendid, so gorgeously bright and significant that they held mine for a second

oing he salon public. There were folding doors between, for a wonder with a lock that worked. By the time we'd bathed,

u rhum." This she wished changed for something-anything-made with Jim's favourite jam. "He would want us to eat

o play the piano in the public drawing room next door. At the first touch, I recognized a master hand. The air was from Puccini

into a crystal cup. It was so sweet that it hurt-hurt horribly and deliciously, as only Italian music can hurt. Other men sing with thei

ut of reach forever. It showed me my past hopes and future sorrows floating on the current of my own blood like ships of a secret argosy sailing through the night to some unknown goal. So now, when I have told you what it did to me, you will know that voice

hand made me start. The little old lady's, small, cool fingers were on mine, "My daughter, what do the words mean?" she asked. "

mother all about his love, but it is too big for any words he can find. He says she must rememb

g it sounds! Can it be a man singing? It seems

ngers they make records of," she explained. "There, he's stopped. Oh, James, don't let him go! We m

l death then obey; but, unabashed, the Americ

re of his companion, the girl in nurse's dress. His back and her profile were turned our way, but at the sound of the opening door he wheeled

vertheless, there was a striking difference between the two. It wasn't only that he was squarely built, with a short throat, and a head shaped like Caruso's, whereas she was slight, with a small, high-held head on a slender neck. The chief difference lay i

a few steps forward, while th

ly as a shuttlecock over the old man's head to us in the next room. It was asked in En

and was to beg for more music. "It's like being at

d his brilliant white teeth. "Delighted!" he said. "I can't sing properl

o choose, began in a low voice an old, sweet, entirely banal and utte

m dead, m

sad song

no roses

dy cypr

een grass

rs and dew

ou wilt,

hou wilt

ot see th

not feel

t hear the

as if

g through t

not rise

may re

ly may

by that man's voice, the piano softly touched by his hands, the poor old song took my self-control and shivered it like thi

fully. "Perhaps I oughtn't to have sung that stuff, Mr. Beckett," he said.

here was a gentle, charming smile on his southern face, but I kn

en her hands. But she, too, was looking at me. She had no expression whatever. Her eyes told as little as two shut windows with bl

timental story. Besides, the man-evidently the leader-had not at all the face of Nemesis. He looked a merry, happy-go-lucky Italian, only a little subdued at the moment b

ell like lavender and grass pinks-her leitmotif in perfume. "You knew our Jim?" sh

ame a crash as if the house were falling. Window-glass shivered. The hotel shook as though in

was in for