“I hope not for the sake of the work I have before me. Of course this is between us only, and I wish you would not breathe a word of it or any other confidential matter while we are in our rooms. I suspect those walls have ears.”
Mrs. Smythe did not return to the canteen again that afternoon, being engaged, as Grace surmised, in arranging for a new building to take the place of the one destroyed when the ammunition dump blew up. At six o’clock Grace went home to prepare their supper, leaving Elfreda to wait for their relief at the canteen. There was no effort on Grace’s part this time to enter her home quietly, still she made no noise that she was conscious of, but she had no more than gotten to her room than there came a tap on the door. It was Marie.
Grace welcomed her smilingly.
“I am glad to see you out again. How do you feel?”
“Not very well, Madame. I am sore all over. All Huns are brutes!”
“Do you include the good doctor?”
“Ah, the doctor. He is fine on the outside, but the soul, Madame! Why should one say it when one does not know?”
Grace nodded thoughtfully and asked who was with Mrs. Smythe. Marie informed her that Miss Marshall was taking supper with Madame and talking of the war.
“Madame told me to say to you when you came in that you were to go to the new canteen in the morning. It is near the river on the same street as the old one. You are to be there at six o’clock in the morning. Is there anything I can do for you?”
“I believe you have already done something for me. Did you make up the bed and slick up the room?” Grace regarded her smilingly.