THE WORLD WAR COLLECTION OF H. C. MCNEILE (SAPPER). Sapper
gem of sparkling wit, which would have shamed even the writer of mottoes in crackers. . . .
A tentative paw on Joan's knee made her look down. Binks—tired of his abortive blasts at an unresponsive hole—desired refreshment, and from time immemorial tea had been the one meal at which he was allowed to beg. He condescended to eat two slices of saffron cake, and then Vane presented the slop basin to Joan.
"He likes his tea," he informed her, "with plenty of milk and sugar.
Also you must stir it with your finger to see that it isn't too hot.
He'll never forgive you if it burns his nose."
"You really are the most exacting household," laughed Joan, putting the bowl down on the floor.
"We are," said Vane gravely. "I hope you feel equal to coping with us. . . ."
She was watching Binks as he stood beside her drinking his tea, and gave no sign of having heard his remark.
"You know," he continued after a while, "your introduction to Binks at such an early stage in the proceedings has rather spoilt the masterly programme I had outlined in my mind. First you were to be charmed and softened by Mrs. Green's wonderful tea. Secondly, you were to see Binks; be formally introduced. You were to fall in love with him on sight, so to speak; vow that you could never be parted from such a perfect dog again. And then, thirdly. . . ."
"His appearance is all that I could desire," she interrupted irrelevantly; "but I beg to point out that he is an excessively dirty feeder. . . ."
Vane stood up and looked at the offender. "You mean the shower of tea drops that goes backwards on to the carpet," he said reflectively. "'Twas ever thus with Binks."
"And the tea leaves adhering to his beard." She pointed an accusing finger at the unrepentant sinner.
"You should have poured it through that sieve affair," said Vane.
"Your own manners as a hostess are not all they might be. However,
Binks and I are prepared to overlook it for once, and so we will pass
on to the thirdly. . . ."
He handed her the cigarette box, and with a faint smile hovering round her lips, she looked up at him.
"Is your thirdly safe?" she asked.
"Mrs. Green thought it wonderful. A suitable climax to a dramatic situation."
"You've had a rehearsal, have you?"
"Just a preliminary canter to see I hadn't forgotten anything."
"And she approved?"
"She suggested an alternative that, I am rather inclined to think, might be better," he answered. "It's certainly simpler. . . ."
Again she smiled faintly. "I'm not certain that Mrs. Green's simpler alternative strikes me as being much safer than your thirdly," she murmured. "Incidentally, am I failing again in my obvious duties? It seems to me that Binks sort of expects something. . . ." Another fusillade of tail thumps greeted the end of the sentence.
"Great Scott!" cried Vane, "I should rather think you were. However, I don't think you could very well have known; it's outside the usual etiquette book." He handed her the indiarubber dog. "A feint towards the window, one towards the door—and then throw."
A quivering, ecstatic body, a short, staccato bark—and Binks had caught his enemy. He bit once; he bit again—and then, a little puzzled, he dropped it. Impossible to conceive that it was really dead at last—and yet, it no longer hooted. Binks looked up at his master for information on the subject, and Vane scratched his head.
"That sure is the devil, old son," he remarked. "Have you killed it for keeps. Bring it here. . . ." Binks laid it obediently at Vane's feet. "It should squeak," he explained to Joan as he picked it up, "mournfully and hideously."
She came and stood beside him and together they regarded it gravely, while Binks, in a state of feverish anticipation, looked from one to the other.
"Get on with it," he tail-wagged at them furiously; "get on with it, for Heaven's sake! Don't stand there looking at one another. . . ."
"I think," his master was speaking in a voice that shook, "I think the metal squeak has fallen inside the animal's tummy. . . ."
"You ought to have been a vet," answered the girl, and her voice was very low. "Give it to me; my finger is smaller."
She took the toy from Vane's hand and bent over it.
"Thank goodness somebody takes an intelligent interest in matters of import," thought Binks—and then with a dull, unsqueaking thud his enemy fell at his feet.
"My dear—my dear!" His master's voice came low and tense and pretence was over. With hungry arms Vane caught the girl to him, and she did not resist. He kissed her eyes, her hair, her lips, while she lay passively against him. Then she wound her arms round his neck, and gave him back kiss for kiss.
At last she pushed him away. "Ah! don't, don't," she whispered. "You make it so hard, Derek—so awfully hard. . . ."
"Not on your life," he cried exultingly. "It's easy that I've made it, my darling, so awfully easy. . . ."
Mechanically she patted her hair into shape, and then she stooped and picked up the toy.
"We're forgetting Binks," she said quietly. She managed to get the circular metal whistle out of the inside of the toy, and fixed it in its appointed hole, while Vane, with a glorious joy surging through him, leaned against the mantelpiece and watched her in silence. Not until the squeaking contest was again going at full blast in a corner did he speak.
"That was Mrs. Green's simpler alternative," he said reflectively.
"Truly her wisdom is great."
In silence Joan went towards the window. For a while she looked out with unseeing eyes, and then she sank into a big easy chair with her back towards Vane. A thousand conflicting emotions were rioting through her brain; the old battle of heart against head was being waged. She was so acutely alive to his presence just behind her; so vitally conscious of his nearness. Her whole body was crying aloud for the touch of his hands on her again—and then, a vision of Blandford came before her. God! what did it matter—Blandford, or her father, or anything? There was nothing in the world which could make up for—what was it he had called it?—the biggest thing in Life.
Suddenly she felt his hands on her shoulders; she felt them stealing down her arms. She felt herself lifted up towards him, and with a little gasp of utter surrender she turned and looked at him with shining eyes.
"Derek, my darling," she whispered. "Que je t'adore. . . ."
And then of her own accord, she kissed him on the lips. . . .
It was Binks's expression, about a quarter of an hour later, which recalled them to earth again. With an air of pained disgust he regarded them stolidly for a few minutes. Then he had a good scratch on both sides of his neck, after which he yawned. He did not actually say "Pooh," but he looked it, and they both laughed.
"Dear man," she whispered, "wouldn't it be just too wonderful if it could always be just you and me and Binks? . . ."
"And why shouldn't it be, lady?" he answered, and his arm went round her waist. "Why shouldn't it be? We'll just sometimes have to see some horrible outsider, I suppose, and perhaps you or somebody will have to order food every year or so. . . . But except for that—why, we'll just slip down the stream all on our own, and there won't be a little bit of difficulty about keeping your eyes in the boat, grey girl. . . ."
She smiled—a quick, fleeting smile; and then she sighed.
"Life's hell, Derek—just hell, sometimes. And the little bits of
Heaven make the hell worse."
"Life's pretty much what we make it ourselves, dear," said Vane gravely.
"It isn't," she cried fiercely. "We're what life makes us. . . ."
Vane