LOVE

Love

John Blanchard stood up from the bench, straightened his Army  uniform, and studied the crowd of people making their way through  Grand  Central Station.    He looked for the girl whose heart he knew, but  whose face  he didn't, the girl with the rose. His interest in her had begun  thirteen months before in a Florida library.  Taking a book off the  shelf he  found himself intrigued, not with the words of the book, but with the  notes penciled in the margin. The soft handwriting reflected a  thoughtful soul and insightful mind.   In the front of the book, he discovered the previous owner's name,  Miss Hollis Maynell. With time and effort he located her address. She  lived in New York City.  He wrote her a letter introducing himself and  inviting her to correspond.  The next day he was shipped overseas for  service in World War II.

During the next year and one-month the two grew to know each other  through the mail.    Each letter was a seed falling on a fertile heart.  A romance was budding. Blanchard requested a photograph, but she  refused.   She felt that if he really cared, it wouldn't matter what she looked  like.   When the day finally came for him to return from Europe, they  scheduled their first meeting - 7:00 PM at the Grand Central Station  in New  York.  "You'll recognize me," she wrote, "by the red rose I'll be wearing on  my lapel."   So at 7:00 he was in the station looking for a girl whose    heart he loved, but whose face he'd never seen.

I'll let Mr. Blanchard tell you what happened: A young woman was  coming toward me, her figure  long and slim.  Her blonde hair lay back  in    curls from her delicate ears; her eyes were blue as flowers.  Her lips    and chin  had a gentle firmness, and in her pale green suit she was like    springtime come  alive.  I started toward her, entirely forgetting to notice that she  was not  wearing a rose.  As I moved, a small, provocative smile curved her  lips.  "Going  my way, sailor?" she murmured.

Almost uncontrollably I made one step closer to her, and then I saw  Hollis    Maynell.  She was standing almost directly behind the girl.  A woman   well past  40, she had graying hair tucked under a worn hat.   She was more than  plump, her  thick-ankled feet thrust into low-heeled shoes.  The girl in the green  suit was  walking quickly away.  I felt as though I was split in two, so keen  was my  desire to follow her, and yet so deep was my longing for the woman  whose spirit  had truly companioned me and upheld my own.

And there she stood.  Her pale, plump face was gentle and sensible,  her gray  eyes had a warm and kindly twinkle.  I did not hesitate.  My fingers    gripped the  small worn blue leather copy of the book that was to identify me to  her.  This  would not be love, but it would be something precious, something  perhaps even  better than love, a friendship for which I had been and must ever be  grateful.  I squared my shoulders and saluted and held out the book to the woman,  even  though while I spoke I felt choked by the bitterness of my  disappointment.  "I'm  Lieutenant John Blanchard, and you must be Miss Maynell.  I am so glad  you could  meet me; may I take you to dinner?"  The woman's face broadened into a tolerant smile.  "I don't know what  this is  about, son," she answered, "but the young lady in the green suit who  just went  by, she begged me to wear this rose on my coat.   And she said if you  were to ask  me out to dinner, I should go and tell you that she is waiting for you  in the  big restaurant across the street. She said it was some kind of test!"
It's not  difficult to understand and admire Miss Maynell's wisdom. The true nature of a  heart is seen in its response to the unattractive.