Brother Copas leaned on his staff pondering a sudden suspicion.
"Look here," he said; "those anonymous letters—"
"I have not," said Nurse Branscome, "a doubt that Nurse Turner wrote them."
"You have never so much as hinted at this."
"I had no right. I have no right, even now; having no evidence. You would not show me the letter, remember."
"It was too vile."
"As if I—a nurse—cannot look at a thing because it is vile! … I supposed that you had laid the matter aside and forgotten it."
"On the contrary, I have been at some pains—hitherto idle—to discover the writer.… Does Nurse Turner, by the way, happen to start her W's with a small curly flourish?"
"That you can discover for yourself. The Nurses' Diary lies in the Nunnery, in the outer office. We both enter up our 'cases' in it, and it is open for anyone to inspect."
"I will inspect it to-morrow," promised Brother Copas. "Now—this Hospital being full of evil tongues—I cannot well ask you to eat an al fresco supper with me, though"—he twinkled—"I suspect we both carry the constituents of a frugal one under our cloaks."