"Why do you say that?"
"I say it because I know it. Why won't you do things? You might copy Katherine Hunt, for instance."
"Or Mollie," she said. She coloured crimson as she spoke, and then her face turned white.
"Or Mollie, brave Nurse Mollie," answered Keith, and a rich colour dyed his cheeks and mounted to his brow.
Kitty looked at him. She saw the expression in his eyes, and every remnant of self-control deserted her.
"Gavon," she said, "I will have the truth. Oh, I should not be miserable were it not for you! You come to see me when you cannot help it; but you don't love me—you never loved me!"
He was silent; his lips took that hard, firm line which they wore at times, but which Kitty had seldom seen; his eyelids narrowed slightly, and he watched Kitty with a curious expression on his face. She was too mad with rage and misery to be checked even by that look.
"You are recommended for your V.C.," she said; "and you will get it, I suppose. Oh, I know you are brave, very brave against the Boers, but you can hurt a woman who loves you for all that. You can be false and faithless!"
"That is not true," he answered.
"It is true!" cried the girl. "You are busy, and you don't care; but I am not busy, and I do care. You have no time to think; I have all the long, long hours to think, and I think and think, and I know and know. You don't love me; my heart will break. I came out here to be near you, and ran untold dangers just to be by your side; but I am left in this miserable hotel, and you come to see me only when you must."