“I don’t know as you would exactly like to——”
“Let me tell you,” said Caroline, “as you don’t seem to know, that all my friends have gone to the front.”
There was an emphasis on the pronoun which should have warned the young soldier what was about to occur, but he rushed blindly to his doom.
“I hope not all, Miss Mitford,” he replied.
“Yes, all,” rejoined Caroline, making the “all” very emphatic, “for if they did not they wouldn’t be my friends.”
“But some of us are obliged to stay here to take care of you, you know,” contributed the other young man.
“Well, there are altogether too many of you trying to take care of me,” said Caroline saucily, with some return of her usual lightness, “and you are all discharged.”
“Do you mean that, Miss Mitford?”
“I certainly do.”
“Well, I suppose if we are really discharged, we will have to go,” returned the other.