spread out her arms. “Not one of them knows whether his home will be standing in the morning. But you see how they are.”

“Yes—yes I see.” Cherry swallowed hard.

“The radio,” Miss Meeks murmured. “Now I shouldn’t wonder. Will you sing for them, Miss Ramsey?”

Cherry nodded.

From somewhere a small piano was made to appear. A little Irish girl with a tumbled mass of red hair took her place before it. A small platform—a heavy packing box—was placed beside the piano.

After shedding her heavy coat, Cherry stood before her strange audience. All lovely in gold and blue, she caught their eyes at once. Leaning over, she whispered to the girl at the piano, giving her the name of her first song. The social worker clapped her hands for silence. Deep, appreciative silence followed.

“Miss Ramsey, a friend of Lady Applegate, from Dorset way, will sing to us,” Miss Meeks announced. “Let’s give her a hand.” The applause was tumultuous.

Somehow, a light, not too strong, was made to play on the slender girl as she sang.

“In the gloaming, Oh my darling,

When the lights are dim and low.”

She sang the song through to the end. The applause that followed drowned out the sound of exploding bombs.

“More! More!” came from every corner.

The social worker slid a microphone before the singer. Bending over, a smile on her lips, Cherry once more whispered a title. Then, lifting her voice high, she cried: “Roll out the Barrel! Everybody sing! Let’s make it ring!”

Everybody did sing,—more people than Cherry will ever know, for through the microphone that had been placed before her, Cherry was at last singing on the radio. From end to end of England the song boomed on: “Roll out the Barrel.”

Every platform in the subway had its radio. Station by station they joined in until the whole tube, miles on end, echoed with the song.

“Roll out the barrel! We’ll have a barrel of fun

Roll out the barrel! We’ll put the blues on the run.”

It seemed to Dave as he listened after 

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