The parlour-maid received her sumptuously,
and Praddy's eyes watered with senile tears.
But Vivie would have no melancholy. "Oh Praddy! If you only knew.
It's worth going to prison to know the joy of coming out of it! I'm
so happy at thinking this is my last day in England for ever so
long. When the War is over, I think I shall settle in Switzerland
with mother--or perhaps all three of us--you with us, I mean--in
Italy. We'll only come back here when the Women have got the Vote.
Now to-night you shall take me to the theatre--or rather I'll take
_you_. I've thought it all out beforehand, and Bertie Adams has
secured the seats. It's _The Chocolate Soldier_ at the Adelphi, the
only war piece they had ready; there are two stalls for us and
Bertie and his wife are going to the Dress Circle. My Cook's ticket
is taken for Brussels and I leave to-morrow by the Ostende route."
"To-morrow" was the 12th of August, and Dora was not yet in being to
interpose every possible obstacle in the way of the civilian
traveller. Down to the Battle of the Marne in September, 1914, very
little difficulty was made about crossing the Channel, especially
off the main Dover-Calais route.
So in the radiant noon of that August day Vivie looked her last on
the brown-white promontories, cliffs and grey castle of Dover,
scarcely troubling about any anticipations one way or the other, and
certainly having no prevision she would not recross the Channel for
four years and four months, and not see Dover again for five or six
years.
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