“I can’t believe either of them would steal little Jane,” declared the major. “They are too fond of her for that.”
“But the baby has been stolen, nevertheless,” returned Arthur; “we can’t get around that fact. And one of the nurses did it”
“Why?”
“Because the nurses disappeared with the baby.”
“Then perhaps they’ve entered into a conspiracy, and both are equally guilty in the abduction,” suggested the major.
“No; their hatred of one another would prevent any conspiracy between them. Only one stole the baby away, I’m quite sure.”
“Then where’s the other nurse?”
Arthur made no reply, but the major expected none. It was one of those mysteries that baffle the imagination. By and by Major Doyle made an attempt to answer his question himself, unconsciously using the same argument that his daughter Patsy had during her conversation with Beth.
“For the sake of argument, and to try to get somewhere near the truth,” said he, “let us concede that, after we had gone to town, the two nurses quarreled. That would not be surprising; I’ve been expecting an open rupture between them. Following the quarrel, what happened? In view of the results, as we find them, two deductions are open to us. One girl may have made away with the other, in a fit of unreasoning rage, and then taken baby and run away to escape the consequences of her crime. If that conclusion is true, Inez is the more likely to be the criminal and it is Mildred’s dead body we shall find in a clump of bushes or hidden in the cellar. That Mexican girl has a fierce temper; I’ve seen her eyes gleam like those of a wildcat as she watched Mildred kiss and cuddle little Jane. And she was so madly devoted to baby that she’d sooner die than part with her. Mildred is different; she’s more civilized.”
“To me, her eyes seem more treacherous than those of Inez,” declared Arthur, who had liked the little Mexican nurse because she had been so fond of Toodlums. “They never meet your gaze frankly, those eyes, but seem always trying to cover some dark secret of which the girl is ashamed.”