Mrs. Cartwright smiled at her, answering her in two words that seemed ordinary enough.
"I know."
But they meant, to the elder woman, something very different from the gentle agreement that they conveyed to the girl.
Claudia Cartwright heard again the hasty whisper with which Jack had taken leave of her those hours ago. "I want Her to stay here," he told her. "I'd want you to take care of her."
At the time Mrs. Cartwright had been paralyzed with surprise. Golden Awdas to stay with her? Why?
Why on earth should Jack leave her——tonight of all nights? She, the bride, had seemed to see nothing stupefying in his action in going off with Captain Ross when the warning came through.
But Mrs. Cartwright knew that Captain Ross had his own duty, not anything in which Jack must help him. Jack was free, she'd heard, until ten o'clock tomorrow morning. It was not Jack's pidgin to do anything until then.... Therefore why in the name of all that was extraordinary hadn't he taken his bride away when the others all went? Why hadn't he taken her off home with him, or to the hotel where he put up, or wherever it was?
Then, very quickly, she'd seen why.
One of the cleverest soldiers of her acquaintance had already told Claudia that, could the true history of these campaigns ever be written, it would read not merely like another version of the War, but like another War. She guessed how many things planned never happen and how many things happen that were never planned, and how few of either get into the papers. Oh, the difference between the published account and the story of the man who was there! Tomorrow would see a report of this raid, which would say nothing at all of the men whose duty ... it had not been to beat back the raiders. It was not Jack's duty to go up that night. It was his duty not to go.
But——