travel, for they were to move on now as if they were going into a combat area.

“Seems like the real thing,” said Mabel eagerly.

They had had their supper and were ready for bed early when they heard a knock on their door. It proved to be Lieutenant Hauser.

“Long-distance call for you, Miss Dale,” she said when they opened the door.

Nancy stood stunned for a moment. Her arrangement with the folks back home was that she would call them every Sunday at two o’clock, as long as phone calls of that kind were permissible. She had talked with her mother and father only a few hours ago, though she had not been able to tell them she was moving on to another address. They would have to be informed about that later when the unit had arrived safely. To have them call back like this alarmed her. She knew no one else who would call her by long-distance telephone here.

“She said you had a long-distance call,” Mabel repeated, when Nancy still stood where she had received the message.

“But why would they be calling back?” Nancy wanted to know.

“Oh come on, gal!” exclaimed Mabel, wrapping her housecoat around her and taking Nancy’s arm. “How will you ever face all those bombs if you get so scared over a little telephone bell ringing?”

Nancy could think only that something terrible must have happened to her parents. She let Mabel lead her like a sleep-walker to the phone in Lieutenant Hauser’s office.

“Hello! Yes—this is Nancy. Oh Dad, that you? I was afraid something was wrong with you or Mom.”

Mabel could hear Mr. Dale’s deep voice as she stood close to Nancy: “No, we’re all right, but we had upsetting news just now from the government—”

“From the government—you—you mean about Tommy?” asked Nancy.

“They report he’s been missing in action over enemy territory since the second of March.”

“Oh Dad!” wailed Nancy. “It can’t be true! It just can’t! God wouldn’t let anything happen to our Tommy.”

“Not if our prayers can keep it from happening, darling,” came the firm voice confidently over the wire. “You just keep on praying like we’ve been doing all along, and he’ll be taken care of.”

 Prev. P 30/131 next