Rosanna with her usual directness asked Miss Hooker the moment they entered what was the matter with Lucy.
Miss Hooker hesitated. “You really ought not ask a question like that, Rosanna,” she said finally, “but perhaps I ought to tell you. You will all have to know.”
“Please don’t tell me, Miss Hooker,” Rosanna begged with a deep flush. “I thought perhaps someone had died or something like that.”
“No, but for a week Lucy must be a dead Scout herself.”
“How awful!” cried both girls, and then were silent.
“I prefer not to tell you why just now, but of course this will not make you shun her. You must show all the kindness and consideration that you can for her, and be with her all you can.” More than that Miss Hooker did not seem to want to say, and the girls, saddened and quiet, finished their errand and left.
A day or two later, going with Mrs. Hargrave to the Red Cross rooms down town, Elise thought she saw Lucy Breen shrink out of sight behind some portières at the back of the store that the Red Cross used as a sales room.
Elise acted on a generous impulse. She went back through the store looking at one thing and another until she in turn came to the portières. Behind them was a space used for a sort of store-room for articles brought into the shop, and as Elise looked curiously through the curtains as though wondering what lay beyond, she saw Lucy standing in a corner, crowded against the wall. Elise nodded gaily.
“Are you what they call making the sort of things in here, Lucy?” she cried. “Is it not fun to see what the good kind people give away?”
She stepped into the store-room as she spoke, smiling and nodding. “Yes, it is droll, some of the things,” she chattered on, as though Lucy was doing her share in the conversation. Finally, however, like a little clock, Elise ran down. She could not think of a single thing to say further, and she trailed off, looking shyly into Lucy’s dark face.