It was a bright day in May that Mrs. Chatterton and Laura Mae took hold of the little Laura Gene's hand and went out into the flower garden to look at the early flowers. The tulips and lilacs were opening so beautifully with the warm breath of spring upon them.

"Aren't they lovely? I thought that John would surely have been here by the time these bloomed this spring," Mrs. Chatterton said as she picked a bouquet of purple pansies from their bed. "In his last letter, he said that he would be back here in time to spend Decoration Day with us."

"It has been three months since he came back from France and he is not home yet," Laura Mae said. "It has been so nice that you could go back and visit him each month."

"Yes, I have told him so much about you and Baby her, that he thinks of you now as part of the family."

"Perhaps he will change his mind when he comes and sees us for himself," the young woman said, returning the smile.

"He says that it has given him a lot of peace of mind to know that I have not been lonesome while he has been away. I do not know what on earth I would have done without you two being here to cheer me up."

"Who is John?" the baby girl asked.

"Why, he is Gam'ma's soldier boy, don't you remember? We are waiting for him to come home."

"Oh, des, I wemember," Laura Gene said, looking down the walk. "Lookie, a messiger boy tumming up a teps."

"A messenger boy?" Mrs. Chatterton asked as she hurried in the direction of the boy. She signed the book the boy held out for her when he had turned and was going back down the walk, she opened the envelope and read the message.

"Mother, will be home on 4:10 train, May 20th, am well. Love, John,"

My, the twentieth," the mother said excitedly, "Why, today is the twentieth! He will be home this very afternoon! In just two more hours he will be here! Oh, I am so happy I could cry!" Tears were glistening in her eyes as she spoke.

She ran into the house, then hurriedly gave orders to the servants, they must see that John's room was dusted and made ready for him. The cook must have a special feast prepared by dinner time. Carlos must shine the car with special care, while she dressed ready to meet John at the station.

Everything in the spacious house was spotlessly clean by four o'clock. Carlos and his mistress had driven away in the car. Laura Mae dressed in her prettiest afternoon dress. She was as excited, for soon, she was to be introduced to Mrs. Chatterton's wonderful Soldier Boy. Little Laura Gene's golden ringlets were made with special care and a pretty pink satin boy of ribbon was tied high up on one of them. She was dressed like a doll in a pretty crepe de chine dress of the same color pink as the satin bow on her hair. She could not grasp the whole meaning of all that was taking place about the house, but she was sure that something great was about to happen. The maid, the butler, and the cook were all anxiously waiting. They had all worked for Mrs. Chatterton for years before the war broke out and they had all missed John very much.

At four-thirty, the long shining car purred up the drive and stopped. The anxious group in the house stepped out to give John an informal but very hearty welcome. The young man greeted the servants with a happy smile.

"May, this is John," Mrs. Chatterton said, holding proudly her son's arm.

"How do you do, John?" Laura Mae extended her soft white hand to him. She had a radiant smile on her face. John took the hand courteously.

"I am surely pleased to meet you, May," he said in all earnestness.

Mrs. Chatterton picked up the pretty little girl and held her tenderly in her arms. "And John," she said with a pride of a real grandmother, "This is our baby girl, isn't she sweet?"

"I'll say she is," John said, shaking the little dimpled hand. "What is your name, Dolly?"

"Loa Jen," she answered shyly, then rested her curly head in the curve of Mrs. Chatterton's neck.

"You are a big lady to tell me your name," he patted her little shoulder gently.

"Is you weally John, Gamma's soldier boy?" the little tot grew brave enough to ask the man who was a stranger to her.

"Yes, Honey, he is really John my soldier boy," Mrs. Chatterton answered before the young man could. "We have waited a long time for him to come back home, haven't we?"

Laura Mae's heart was pounding rapidly and beneath the smile on her face deep sorrow. If it were only Gene who was returning to her. She had gone into the Kingsford National Bank several times, knowing that Gene has said that his money was there on their wedding day. She had made herself acquainted with the cashier, whose name she learned was Mr. Baldwin. He had revealed to her the fact that she was the joint owner of a checking account there, and that everything that Gene owned there had been willed to her. The bank had never had a word from Gene. He had not drawn a cent of money out since he had gone on Uncle Sam's payroll. It surely was a mystery to all of them.

Mr. Baldwin said that Everett Whitmer came into the bank occasionally and when they asked him if he had had word from Gene, his answer each time had been in the negative. It always made the uncle look so sad, Mr. Baldwin had explained that they had never gone into conversation about Gene, but one thing was sure, he had never returned from France.

John looked closely at Laura Mae. "Her face looks familiar," he thought to himself, "I have seen her or her picture somewhere before. By George, she even reminds me of my nurse over in France. I wonder whatever became of gentle Martha." He caught himself staring at the girl and blushed, just a trifle embarrassed when he realized that she had noticed what he was doing.

When they went into the house, the servants resumed their duties and the apparently happy group visited for a while. Mrs. Chatterton had so many questions to ask John that the conversation was carried on almost entirely between the mother and son. At length, there came a pause. The baby girl leaned back on Laura Mae's lap and patted her mother's chin with her chubby little hand. She yawned as only a sleepy child can yawn.

"Mony May, I sleepy," she said in her baby way.

"You and I have been so excited, dear, that we have forgotten all about you having your afternoon nap. Come; Mony May will rock you to sleep." She turned to Mrs. Chatterton, "Will you please excuse me?"

"Surely. My baby must have her nap, even if it is late. Come, Babe, and kiss Gamm night-night." The child ran and put her soft little arms about Mrs. Chatterton's neck, then gave the lady an honest kiss.

"Kiss John, Mony May?" the girl asked. She had called her mother "Mony" from the time she had begun to toddle about. Later, she had combined it with the name, May. Mrs. Chatterton had always been "Gamma" to her.

"Yes, you may kiss John 'Night-night' if you wish." Laura Mae smiled to think that her baby did not wish to slight anyone that belonged to the family group. The little dimpled tot ran to John and offered him her rosy puckered lips. With an amused grin, he picked her up and kissed her softly, then she stood her back down on the floor again. He rose and stood very politely, by his chair as Laura Mae caught the little girl by the hand and led her out of the room.

John sat down near his mother and they began talking again. In a few minutes, they stopped to listen. In the nursery, they could hear Laura Mae singing, so softly, the words to "Sweet and Low."

"Oh, John," Mrs. Chatterton said when the verse was finished, "If only the baby's father would come to it soon." She wiped a tear from her eye and continued, "She has been so brave and so true to him! I only hope that when he does come back, he will be one who will deserve such loyalty. I know that her heart is breaking but she can smile anyway."

"She surely does seem like a nice girl. What did you say her husband's name is?"

"She often speaks of him as Gene. His last name is Elison."

"Elison," John repeated, "I don't know of anyone by that name. My buddy's name is Eugene, we always called him Gene."

"Yes, I remember. You wrote and told me about his wife dying during the war. What became of him?" she asked.

"He stayed over in France. I hear from him quite often. He studied civil engineering before the war and now he has a good job of the damage the Germans caused and trying to forget his sorrow."

"It must be terrible the way things were destroyed in the battlegrounds over there."

"Mother, war is as near my conception of 'Hell' as anything I can think of! Anyone who has not seen it cannot imagine what it is like!"

"Your father fought in the Spanish-American Was, son, but I guess that was nothing to what you boys saw over there in France," the mother said.

"I never used to like a coward, Mother, but if I had known just what it was going to be like before I went, I don't think they would have ever found me when it came time to go."

"What would you have done?" the mother asked, knowing that the boy was only joking, for if any American boy was true blue, John was.

"I might have hidden away up in the mountains somewhere or something like that." He grinned, then added soberly. "We saw plenty over there, please don't ever ask me to describe it to you. I would rather not think or talk about it. I would wipe all of the scenes from memory if I could." John suppressed a shudder as he spoke.

"Very well then, John, I will not ask you to discuss it with me." Mrs. Chatterton promised. "If you speak of your buddy to May, don't mention that his name is Gene, it may only open the wound afresh."

"All right, you darling lady, anything you say goes! I am glad to be back home that I will try my best to do anything you ask of me."

"If you mean that, I think I shall ask you to go to your room now and rest before dinner. You have had a long and tiresome trip. Will you do that for me?"

"If you say so, Mother," John smiled, revealing two rows of even pearly teeth. He gave his mother a loving caress and kissed her tenderly. "Say, that sire is a cute little kid with the curly hair," he remarked.

"Isn't she adorable I don't know how I would get along without either of them. I gave May a new black lace dress for a Christmas gift and do you know, she has never worn it yet! It would do her good if she would get out among people more. She has stayed so close to home and has given such perfect care to that baby- Oh, you run along now, or I will keep you here talking to you until dinner time and you will not get the rest that I am sure you need very badly." She gave him a gentle push toward the door.

John went to his room with a light heart. How it thrilled him to see his old pennants on the wall where he had hung them before he went away. Photographs of old school chums sat on his dresser where he had placed them himself. "It is paradise to be back home again," he thought as he stood by the window overlooking the lilac bushes that seemed like huge lavender cushions down there in the garden. In the distance, the peaks in the Rocky Mountain Range stood like white-crowned monarchs, sending out a challenge to the whole world, daring anyone to dispute their right to reign, supremely, there.