when I got it. I thought it marked an epoch in my
life; that it was a token of success. Well, when I was coming over to
your side of the water, to try out the _Golden Eagle_ among all the
English flyers, I was silly enough to think if she did any good, I'd
stick this poor old stripe on her somewhere, for auld lang syne. Now I'd
rather give it to you, little soldier."

I think it was at that minute I began to worship him. I worshipped him
as a child worships, and as a woman worships, too; except that, perhaps,
when a woman lets herself go with a flood of love for a man, she
unconsciously expects some return. I'm sure I didn't expect anything.
That would have been too ridiculous!

I felt rather guilty about depriving the _Golden Eagle_ of her master's
trophy, but after all, a girl is more appreciative than a monoplane; and
besides, it would have hurt Captain March's feelings in that mood of
his, if I'd refused. I had a conviction that a corporal's stripe, given
as a reward and an incentive, would be to me a talisman. I decided that
I'd keep it in a place where I could rush to look at it whenever I
needed encouragement to go on being a soldier. If I wanted to sneak
myself out of trouble with a fib, or be snappish to Father or cattish to
Di, or say "damn," or bang a door in a rage, it seemed to me that I
should only have to think of that little triangle of black cloth and
gilt braid to be suddenly as good as gold, all the way through to my
heart.

Maybe I showed some of these thoughts in my eyes when I thanked Captain
March (Di says my eyes tell all my secrets), for he was nicer than ever,
in the chivalrous, almost tender way some men have with girl-children.
He said he was just as lonely as I was, or worse, because he hadn't a
soul who belonged to him in England, and would it be quite proper and
all right for an old soldier like him to invite a little girl like me to
lunch?

Of course I said yes--_yes_, it would be entirely proper and perfectly
splendid, though they might have forgotten to put anything of the sort
into books of etiquette. By that time it was half-past twelve, only a
few minutes left to dash to Selfridge's and rescue the dress (if it
wasn't already lost) before luncheon, so Captain March offered to whisk
me up to the shop in a taxi. He promised, if the gown were gone, that
he'd help me choose another. But it wasn't gone; which showed that, as
I'd felt in my bones, it really had been born for me.

"Why