England to
live. It was one of a row of houses that looked very much alike, which,
itself, was one of four sides of a square. In the centre of the square was
a park-like space, a garden, really. In this garden were several tennis
courts, with plenty of space, also, for nurses and children. There are
many such squares in London, and they help to make the British capital
a delightful place in which to live.
As he went in, Harry saw a lot of the younger men who lived in the
square playing tennis. It was still broad daylight, although, at home,
dusk would have fallen. But this was England at the end of July and the
beginning of August, and the light of day would hold until ten o'clock
or thereabout. That was one of the things that had helped to reconcile
Harry to living in England. He loved the long evenings and the chance
they gave to get plenty of sport and exercise after school hours.
The school that he and Dick attended was not far away; they went to it
each day. A great many of the boys boarded at the school, but there
were plenty who, like Dick and Harry, did not. But school was over
now, for the time. The summer holidays had just begun.
At the table there was much talk of the war that was in the air. But Mr.
Fleming did not even yet believe that war was sure.
"They'll patch it up," he said, confidently. "They can't be so mad as to
set the whole world ablaze over a little scrap like the trouble between
Austria and Servia."
"Would it affect your business, dear?" asked Mrs. Fleming. "If there
really should be war, I mean ?"
"I don't think so," said he. "I might have to make a flying trip home, but
I'd be back. Come on -- time for us to go. What are you going to do,
boy? Going over to Grenfel's, aren't you ?"
"Yes, father," said Harry.
"All right. Get home early. Good-night!"
A good many of the boys were already there when Dick and Harry
reached Grenfel's house. The troop -- the Forty-second, of London --
was a comparatively small one, having only three patrols. But nearly all
of them were present, and the scout-master took them out into his
garden.
"I'm going to change the order a bit," he said, gravely. "I want to do
some talking, and then I expect to answer questions. Boys, Germany
has declared war on Russia. There are reports already of fighting on the
border between France and Germany. And there seems to be an idea
that the Germans are certain to strike at France through Belgium. I may
not be here very long -- I may have to turn over the troop to another
scoutmaster. So I want to have a long talk to-night." There was a
dismayed chorus.
"What? You going away, sir? Why?"
But Harry did not join. He saw the quiet blaze in John Grenfel's eyes,
and he thought he knew.
"I've volunteered for foreign service already," Grenfel explained. "I
saw a little fighting in the Boer war, you know. And I may be useful.
So I thought I'd get my application in directly. If I go, I'll probably go
quietly and quickly. And there may be no other chance for me to say
good-bye."
'Then you think England will be drawn in, sir?" asked Leslie Franklin,
leader of the patrol to which Dick and Harry belonged, the Royal
Blues.
"I'm afraid so," said Grenfels grimly. "There's just a chance still, but
that's all -- the ghost of a chance, you might call it. I think it might be
as well if I explained a little of what's back of all this trouble. Want to
listen? If you do, I'll try. And if I'm not making myself clear, ask all the
questions you like."
There was a chorus of assent. Grenfel sat in the middle, the scouts
ranged about him in a circle. "In the first place," he began, "this Servian
business is only an excuse. I'm not defending the Servians -- I'm taking
no sides between Servia and Austria. Here in England we don't care
about that, because we know that if that hadn't started the war,
something else would have been found.
"England wants peace. And it seems that, every so often, she has to
fight for it. It was so when the Duke of Marlborough won his battles at
Blenheim and Ramillies and Malplaquet. Then France was the
strongest nation in Europe. And she tried to crush the others and
dominate everything. If she had, she would have been strong enough,
after her victories, to fight us over here -- to invade England. So
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