"No, not yet. If there is need, I shall tell you—because I trust you as fully as I trust your father and mother, and I have a very high opinion of your courage and ability. At present, you have only to remember what I have told you to do."
Gareth was very inquisitive about my movements when, as the dusk fell, I began to prepare for the work in hand. She plied me with prattling questions; why I was at such pains over my dressing; why I took a large cloak on a night comparatively warm; what the thick muffling veil was for; and she gave a little cry of terror when her sharp eyes caught sight of the revolver which I tried to slip into my pocket unnoticed.
"You are such a strange girl, Christabel," she said.
"Every one tells me that; but I generally get there."
"'Get there?' What is that?"
"An Americanism, dear, for gaining your own end."
"Are all American girls like you?" she laughed.
"Luckily for them, perhaps, no. I'm from the Middle West and we have more freedom there than in the Old World."
"Do you all go about in thick cloaks with heavy veils and carrying arms?"
"Gareth, no," I laughed. "We only do these things in fancy dress balls."