One day she received a card from an old schoolmate, a girl who had
married out of Carley's set, and had been ostracized. She was living
down on Long Island, at a little country place named Wading River. Her
husband was an electrician--something of an inventor. He worked hard. A
baby boy had just come to them. Would not Carley run down on the train
to see the youngster?
That was a strong and trenchant call. Carley went. She found indeed a
country village, and on the outskirts of it a little cottage that must
have been pretty in summer, when the green was on vines and trees.
Her old schoolmate was rosy, plump, bright-eyed, and happy. She saw
in Carley no change--a fact that somehow rebounded sweetly on Carley's
consciousness. Elsie prattled of herself and her husband and how they
had worked to earn this little home, and then the baby.
When Carley saw the adorable dark-eyed, pink-toed, curly-fisted baby she
understood Elsie's happiness and reveled in it. When she felt the soft,
warm, living little body in her arms, against her breast, then she
absorbed some incalculable and mysterious strength. What were the
trivial, sordid, and selfish feelings that kept her in tumult compared
to this welling emotion? Had she the secret in her arms? Babies and
Carley had never become closely acquainted in those infrequent meetings
that were usually the result of chance. But Elsie's baby nestled to
her breast and cooed to her and clung to her finger. When at length the
youngster was laid in his crib it seemed to Carley that the fragrance
and the soul of him remained with her.
"A real American boy!" she murmured.
"You can just bet he is," replied Elsie. "Carley, you ought to see his
dad."
"I'd like to meet him," said Carley, thoughtfully. "Elsie, was he in the
service?"
"Yes. He was on one of the navy transports that took munitions to
France. Think of me, carrying this baby, with my husband on a boat full
of explosives and with German submarines roaming the ocean! Oh, it was
horrible!"
"But he came back, and now all's well with you," said Carley, with a
smile of earnestness. "I'm very glad, Elsie."
"Yes--but I shudder when I think of a possible war in the future. I'm
going to raise boys, and girls, too, I hope--and the thought of war is
torturing."
Carley found her return train somewhat late, and she took advantage of
the delay to walk out to the wooded headlands above the Sound.