“Can’t I help, too?” whispered Lucie.
Paulette shook her head, but one of the nurses beckoned to her and she followed her to the sacristy where a sort of kitchen was established. “I wouldn’t stay in there,” said the nurse. “Perhaps you can help here. You can, maybe, wash dishes.”
“Oh, I can do that,” Lucie assured her and diligently set to work, feeling thankful that something useful was her part to perform.
She was not long at her occupation, however, for before she had quite finished the pile before her, Victor came back.
“Your friend, the young man, has returned,” some one came to tell her.
Lucie looked inquiringly at the young woman who was in charge. She nodded encouragingly. “Go, my dear. You have been very helpful,” said the woman.
She gave up the towel she had been using and went softly out, tiptoeing past the row of cots. Victor was waiting on the steps. “What news?” inquired Lucie.
“All’s well,” he answered. “That grandfather has been through here. He left word with the man who has been station master but who no more is so because there is no station. With this person he has left word that he is not allowed to stop and is going on to the next point where one can get a train, and there you are to meet him. If by any chance you miss him, you and Paulette are to proceed direct to Paris and communicate with him at the house of one Jacques Moulin.”
“Oh yes, I know this Jacques person. He came often to buy goods at the factory and would sometimes come to dine with us.”
“He is a young man?” asked Victor.