That brought her to the thought of Peter. “Of course, he didn’t want me. And I never loved him. He always did and always will love Joanna. Whether he gets her or not, she’s the woman for him. He needs her as I need Philip.” She lay quite still then, concentrating, probing her inmost spirit. “As I need no one,” she said to herself aloud. “If I ever get well again I shall be what I want to be without depending on anybody. And I shall always be content.”
Who shall explain the relation between mind and spirit? She grew better after that, began to sit up and, joining one of her mother’s myriad committees, engaged in the preparation of outfits for the men overseas. Very slowly, almost reluctantly her interest in life came creeping back with her strength. She grew to be like the little girl she had been long, long ago, before her overpowering desire got possession of her. But she needed the stimulus of an occupation which would take her out of herself.
“If I could find something which would make me forget everything that is past, Harry,” she told the young doctor. He had fallen into the habit of taking her on his rounds two and three times a week. The air did her good and the occasion gave him a chance to study her.
“It will turn up, the right thing always does,” he comforted her. “You know you are lots better already.”
“Yes, so much better than you can guess,” she returned, leaving him slightly mystified at the peculiar expression with which she was regarding him. He would have been more astonished if he could have read her thought. “Once,” she said to herself, “I might have tried to make him like me, tried to get him to marry me and lift me out of my obscurity. My, I’m glad that’s over.”
Once on her return from one of these trips her mother came rushing to her. “Guess who’s here, Maggie? But, pshaw, you’d never guess. John Howe, do you remember?”
John Howe who had come to her rescue in the early days! “Now you just set still,” her mother fussed about her, “and I’ll bring him up. He’s the Reverend John Howe now. I’ll bet, he’ll do you good.”
Ministers for some reason are either fat or lean. John Howe ran to the lean type. He came in looking very much as usual, to stay only “five minutes,” he told Mrs. Ellersley.
He stayed five hours and Maggie poured out her heart, her first liking for Philip, her marriage, her discovery of her husband’s “profession,” her engagement to Peter and her insensate determination to hold on to him.
“And then Henderson killed himself. Oh, John, I’ve been a wicked, wicked creature.”
“Not as bad as all that, Maggie, but life has been as unkind to you as though you had been. That’s the trouble—whether you burn yourself intentionally or not, you get hurt all the same. And it’s all over now, you’ve quite decided to let—to break with this Bye fellow?”
“You were right at first. To let him go. Yes.”
“H’m, what do you suppose he’ll do then, go back to this other girl?”
“It sounds so funny to hear you talk of her that way, so slightingly, almost,” said Maggie, a little surprised.
“Well, of course, she’s nothing to me. Daresay she’s a nice enough girl, though she sounds a bit priggish. Do you think she’ll take him back?”
“Oh, I hardly think so. You see, she’s the only one of us who’s kept on and got what she wanted out of life. She’s on the stage, a dancer, the success of the season! Peter’s just barely through school, if indeed he did get through, and, anyway, he’s still as poor as a church mouse. And I’m just Miss Nobody. The thing is—if Peter wants to go to her, he can.”
“And what will you do?”
“I don’t know. I can’t guess. Something I hope very different that will take me as completely out of myself as though I had been transposed to a fourth dimension. Can’t you think of something, John?”
“I don’t know, I believe I have a sort of idea. Are you pretty strong now, Maggie?”
“The Doctor says I’m as strong as I’ll ever be without change of interests and surroundings. Let’s hear about your idea.”
“No, that’s enough for today. Besides, I’m not sure enough of it.” But he came back the next day fortified. The Young Men’s Christian Association had decided to send a few colored women workers among the colored men at the front. Two had already gone, but more were needed. If he could get the position for Maggie it would prove just the change she needed. Did she think she could go?
“Me,” Maggie breathed, “go to France! To help the poor boys! Oh, I’d love it, John.”
It was the thing for her. Of course, its accomplishment took time and much handling of red tape, but it did come to pass and Maggie, leaving behind her an apprehensive mother and cousin—for the day of submarines was not yet over—set sail for France. She landed at Brest, from Brest she went to Paris, where she was summoned to Chambéry to help Mrs. Terry, the colored worker, in charge of the leave-center in the Savoyard capital.
Maggie was taken out of herself completely. The voyage, the danger, the foreign language and new customs went to her head like wine. The need of the men overwhelmed and staggered her. They were pathetically proud of her—and of Mrs. Terry, too—glad to be allowed a sight of her bright face, to exchange a word. To be permitted to dance
