The cry of surprise, almost of horror, had come involuntarily to Rosemary's lips. She thought of Mrs. Blakeney, the exquisite grande dame who, after her marriage to Peter's father, the eminent scientist, had won her position in English society by her charm, her tact and that air of high breeding which is becoming so obsolete these days. She thought of Peter himself, who had inherited so much of his mother's charm and all her high-souled notions of noblesse oblige, of what was due to birth and to descent. Did Peter know what little Anna was suffering under this new régime brought about by a treaty of peace that was to bring the millennium to all the peoples of Europe? With a sudden impulse Rosemary put her arms once more round the shrinking little figure.
"Anna," she said earnestly, "I think you are absolutely splendid! I admire your pluck more than I can say. But surely, surely you could find more congenial work than selling groceries!"
She paused a moment, her active brain at once turning to projects that had little Anna's welfare for their aim. Little Anna could not go on selling groceries in an obscure Roumanian town. It was unthinkable! Surely Peter did not know. And how could Rosemary face him with the news that she had found little Anna selling groceries at Cluj?
Something must be done, and quickly, to alter such an awful state of things. While she remained silent, thinking, and Anna, equally silent, fidgeted with long, thin fingers the tassel of her friend's dressing-gown, Rosemary became conscious that Jasper was watching her from the doorway of the next room. How long he had been standing there she did not know. She looked at him over Anna's bent head, and, as usual, she read in his expressive face a divination of her thoughts. It almost seemed as if, with a slight nod of his head, he was actually approving of what she had not yet put into words. Then he stepped back into the other room and quietly closed the door.
"Listen, little one," Rosemary said eagerly. "I am here at the invitation of the Roumanian Government; that is to say, General Naniescu, who, I understand, is military governor of Transylvania, has asked me to come over here and study the conditions, both social and political. I shall be writing several articles for English and American papers, and I simply must have a secretary for my ordinary correspondence, and——"
Anna shook her head.
"I don't know how to type," she said rather curtly, "and I can't do shorthand."
"Neither of which is necessary," Rosemary retorted.
Anna looked her straight in the eyes. "You don't imagine," she said quietly, "that if your articles revealed even a particle of the truth they would ever be allowed to pass the censor, and if they concealed, the truth you would not expect my father's daughter to associate herself with them."
"That's a brave patriotic speech, Anna," Rosemary rejoined with a triumphant little laugh, "but you need not be the least afraid. My articles will contain the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and the censor will have no power over them. I give you my word."