We hurried home; Brian seeming almost to guide us, for without his instinct for the right way we would twice have taken a wrong turning. As we came into the Place Stanislas, still a pale oasis of moonlight, I saw standing in front of the hotel two figures, black as if cut out of velvet. One, that of a man, was singularly tall and thin, as a Mephistopheles of the stage. The other was that of a woman in a long cloak, small and slight as a child of fourteen. Dierdre O'Farrell, of course! It could be no one else. But who was the man? A dim impression that the figure was vaguely familiar, or had been familiar long ago, teased my brain. But surely I could never have seen it before.
"Hurrah! There she is!" cried O'Farrell, "alive and on her pins!"
At the sound of his voice, the velvet silhouettes stirred. They had turned to look at us, and a glint of moonlight made the two faces white and blank as masks. O'Farrell waved his hand, and I was obliged to quicken my steps to keep pace with Brian: "I suppose she got lost—serve her right!—and the beanpole has escorted her home," grumbled Puck; but as he spoke, the beanpole in question hurriedly made a gesture of salute, and stalked away with enormous strides. In an instant he was engulfed by a shadow-wave and his companion was left to meet us alone. I thought it would be like her to whisk into the hotel and vanish before we could arrive, but she did not. She stood still, with a fierce little air of defiance; and as we came near I saw that under the thrown-back cloak her left arm was in a white sling.
Her brother saw it also. "Hullo, what have you been up to?" he wanted to know. "You've given us the scare of our lives!"
"Thank you," the girl said. "Please speak for yourself!"
"He may speak for us, too," Brian assured her. "We thought of the air raid. And even now, I don't feel as if we'd been wrong. Your voice sounds as if you were in pain. You've been hurt!"
"It's nothing at all," she answered shortly, but her tone softened slightly for Brian. Even she had her human side, it seemed. "A window splintered near where I was, and I got a few bits of glass in my arm. They're out now—every one. A doctor came, and looked after me. You see, Jule!" and she nodded her head at the sling. "Now I'm going in to bed. Good-night!"
"Wait, and let my sister help you," Brian proposed. "She's a splendid nurse. I know she'll be delighted."
"Sweet of her!" sneered the girl. "But I'm a trained nurse, too, and I can take care of myself. It's only my left arm that's hurt, and a scratch at that. I don't need any help from any one."
"Was that man we saw the doctor who put you in your sling?" asked "Jule," in the blunt way brothers have of catching up their sisters.