"You and Ian can do that whilst he is up here. I feel my temperature has gone up another point. Give me the thermometer."
She refused that, but went for Major Healy. After all, she reflected, he was an obstinate old man and capable of getting a high temperature just to prove himself in the right.
The introduction over, he turned to her with one of his benignant smiles.
"My child ... you have spent so much time with a poor old man to-day, I am sure Major Healy will excuse you ... you might help Ian check those potatoes."
She took the hint and went out; but not to the potatoes. I am afraid she did a very mean thing. She burned with curiosity to hear what Father Constantine wanted with the American major, and that instinct which often enables a woman to steal a march on man whispered that she was concerned in the priest's mysterious anxiety. It may be true that an eavesdropper hears no good of herself; it is equally true that she sometimes hears things good for herself. Therefore, argued Minnie, it was quite a normal occupation under the circumstances.
The Father's room opened to his dressing-room, approachable from the corridor as well. Thither she tiptoed, to find the door ajar. Slipping in, she stood behind a curtain which hung in the doorway between dressing and bedrooms. There was no door, so she heard very clearly. Father Constantine was talking; she caught the sound of her own name.
"It is not safe for Miss Burton to remain here," he said in his slow, correct English, for the Major had no other tongue. "I have told her so more than once. So has the Countess; and also the Count. But she refuses to listen. She knows how much we value her excellent work with wounded and refugees. But perhaps you can persuade her. Neither the Countess nor her son can insist; it would look as though they wanted to get rid of her."
Major Healy was loath to interfere. He sat, like a giant in repose, by the little chaplain's bed, listening politely, but secretly wishing himself downstairs with the Count, whom he found more interesting every time they talked together. Father Constantine's message had interrupted a long argument not entirely disconnected with big-game shooting. Healy was a keen sportsman himself, and found it very interesting to swap stories with Ian, who did not know the Rockies, but did know the Caucasus and even Cashmere, where he had spent a long-remembered holiday with young Ralph Burton two years ago.
"Well," he said, in slow sonorous tones, his blue eyes watching the snowstorm that raged outside the sealed double window. "Miss Burton looks as if she could take care of herself. I hear that the Grand Duke promised to give warning if the place gets unsafe."
This was not at all what Father Constantine wanted.