At seven that evening Norma found herself in a place of great enchantment. Since her father was with her, the fear of mid-afternoon was gone, and joy reigned supreme.

Those ancient officers’ homes that lined one side of the parade ground had always intrigued her. Now she was really inside one of them, and it was indeed charming.

The mantel above the huge living-room fireplace, as well as the walls on all sides, were lined with fascinating objects of art which she realized must have been brought by her hostess from France.

“Yes, they came from France, all of them—except these.” Lieutenant Warren indicated a small group of photographs. “These,” there was a change in her voice, “these are my people—my mother, my sister, my grandfather. They are from home.”

“Yes, I know how you feel about them.” Norma smiled. “You might be interested to know what I did on my first weekend here.”

“That is always interesting,” replied the hostess. “Girls are so different.”

Norma told how she had rented a hotel room and had put up all her pictures. In her eagerness and excitement she came very nearly going right on, telling of her mysterious and startling experience following Lena and being trapped in a repair shop at night. Just in time she caught herself.

“These things are important,” the Lieutenant replied in a quiet tone. “Don’t let those feelings escape you. When you realize to the full what home and loved ones mean to you and when you contrast America and France as it is today, it makes you want to fight!”

“I am sure of that!” Norma’s father agreed heartily.

“But all these beautiful pictures, these tiny statues, all carved in marble, those silver candlesticks, these etchings!” Norma exclaimed. “How could you afford them?”

“These, my dear,” the Lieutenant beamed—“these all were gifts from those kindly and grateful French people. When I protested they said: ‘But yes! You must take them! You really must! All France will be overrun. The Boche will get them. A thousand times better that you have them.’

“There are names on all of them,” she added. “See? Pierre. Jeanne. Margot. When this terrible war is over many of them shall go back.”

“How wonderful!” Norma murmured.

“These etchings are from that last war. I saw them in Paris,” said Mr. Kent. “They are wonderful.”

“Wonderful and terrible,” Lieutenant Warren murmured.

One etching pictured a huge cannon belching forth hate in the form of black smoke, and emerging from that smoke was a beautiful woman. Her hands had been turned into claws, and on her face was a look of unutterable rage.

“And yet she is gorgeous,” Norma whispered.

The second etching showed a valiant French pilot falling from his wrecked and burning plane down to certain death. But beneath him, hands locked, waiting, ready to catch him and bear him away, were two beautiful angels.

“Yes,” said the Lieutenant who had been through so much in France. “This is war. It is beautiful and it is terrible.”

“This is war,” the gray-haired man agreed.

“And he really knows,” Norma thought.

“Come,” invited the hostess. “Dinner is about to be served.”

There were busy and exciting times in Norma Kent’s life when she ate a meal and enjoyed it to the full and yet, two hours later, she could not have told what she had eaten. This was to be just such a meal. The food was delicious, the silver and dishes charming, but the conversation absorbed all her attention. Little wonder, for it seemed to her that her whole future hung in the balance.

Somewhere between soup and roast chicken Lieutenant Warren said all too casually:

“Did I hear them say you had been asked to enter officers’ training?”

“You may have heard that,” Norma flushed. “It has been suggested by a lady in high position.”

“It’s quite an honor, don’t you think so, Mr. Kent?” The Lieutenant turned to Norma’s father.

“Yes, indeed. It’s the first step up.”

“And you deserve it,” Lieutenant Warren said, with a bright smile. “We’re proud of you. Please accept my congratulations, and allow me to wish you all the luck in the world.”

“Wait a minute!” Norma exclaimed. “Put on the brakes! I haven’t said I would accept.”

Her father gave her a quick look. The smile on Lieutenant Warren’s face appeared to light up a little as she said: “Do you mind telling me why you said that?”

“Not a bit,” was the quick response. “It’s because I want to come up the hard way, Dad,” she said. “That’s how you climbed up in that other war.”

“Yes.” A rare smile spread over the gray-haired man’s face. “However, I had no choice. With me it was that way or not at all.”

“All the same,” Norma insisted, “I want to get out and do some real work. I was in college for four years, and now at the Fort for a month. What I want to know is, can I really do any worthwhile work?”

“Good!” exclaimed Lieutenant Warren. “I hoped you would say that. And now may I serve you some of this chicken while it is hot?”

“But why are you glad?” Norma asked in a puzzled tone, after the chicken had been served.

“Because I am leaving here in two days and I want to take you with me.”

“Going where?” Norma asked in surprise.

“To the coast. I can’t tell you the exact spot because I don’t happen to know, and because if I did know, I would not be permitted to tell. It will be somewhere on the rugged coast of New England, rather far north, I imagine. I am to be given a station of the Interceptor Control, and—”

“Interceptor Control!” Norma exclaimed. “Those words charmed me from the first. They somehow seem to suggest dark night patrols, intrigue, mystery, and perhaps real danger.”

“Perhaps you are making too much of it. That depends,” Lieutenant Warren drew a deep breath. “Be that as it may. I’m in for it, and I am to select a squad to take with me. It’s a relatively small station. One squad will be enough at first.”

“She’s asked my squad to go,” Norma thought. “She didn’t ask me because she thought I might want to take a step up, join the officers’ training school at once.” Then she asked a question on impulse:

“Are you planning to take all my squad—all ten of them?”

“I had hoped to, if you cared to join us.”

“Bu—but—” Norma caught herself. She had been about to betray her secret—her spy complex. What she had wanted to say was, “But how about Lena?”

“It is for you to choose,” the Lieutenant said quietly.

“Oh, I want to go!” Norma exclaimed. “Count me in. Please don’t leave me out, only—” There it was again.

“Only what?”

“Only nothing. Please forgive me,” Norma begged.

And so it was settled. Norma was to be given a two-day leave to be spent at home with her father. Then she was to meet Lieutenant Warren and the squad in Chicago. There they were to board an eastbound train for fields of fresh toil and adventure.

Norma stirred uneasily in her place by the car window. She was on her way—had been for some time. Two or three hours more and she would be looking at the place she and her fellow WACs would call “home” for some time.

“I should be thrilled,” she told herself. “But I’m half scared, that’s all.”

Lena and Rosa were together, five seats ahead of her. They had been together all the way. Nothing strange about that, really. They had shared a Pullman compartment, just as she and Betty had. All the same, it disturbed her.

Suddenly she made a great decision—she would tell Betty all about it. Betty, like as not, would laugh the whole thing off. Then she’d be rid of the spy business for ever.

“Betty,” she said in a low tone, “There is something I want to tell you—a whole lot of things.”

“Okay,” said Betty. “I’m listening.”

“Betty, do you remember the first night we slept in that stable at Fort Des Moines?”

“Do I?” Betty laughed. “First time I ever slept on a cot, and with fifty other girls! That was one nightmare!”

“Well, on that night Lena sat up in her bed and whispered. ‘Gott in Himmel,’ and Rosa flashed a light in her cot, where no light is supposed to show. That got me going.”

“Going? How?” Betty stared.

“I thought they might be spies.”

“Spies? Nonsense! But then—” Betty paused for thought. “I did see Lena down by the gate once. She was talking to that Spanish hairdresser and a strange man, who said, ‘Du must!’ There have been whisperings about that hairdresser. Three days before we left the Fort she disappeared.”

“Betty!” Norma exclaimed softly. “You’re no help at all. You just make matters worse.”

“How? What do you mean?”

“I was hoping you’d rid me of my spy complex—just laugh it off, and here you are, taking the thing seriously. What’s more, I haven’t told you a thing yet.”

“Well then, tell me the rest,” Betty invited. “Then perhaps we’ll both have us a good big laugh.”

“And perhaps we won’t,” Norma added gloomily. “But all right. Here goes.” She leaned over close, talking low. “I saw Rosa’s light three times. One night I asked her why.”

“What did she say?”

“She said her mother had asked her to read a prayer from her prayer book every night.”

“That was nice,” Betty murmured in approval.

“Yes, if it’s true.”

“How could you doubt her?”

“You have to doubt when you don’t really know. Besides, how about this? We went out to visit the airfield one day, and Rosa, without anyone seeing her, climbed into a fighter plane and started across the field with it.”

“She did?” Betty whispered in astonishment.

“Absolutely.” Norma laughed in spite of herself. “And did that start something! She was almost arrested! You see, they were trying out some secret devices in those planes.”

“How did she ever explain that?” Betty was filled with astonishment.

“She never explained it.”

Norma Leaned Over Close, Talking Low