“The left.”
“Then I’ll sit on the right. You want me to stay here, don’t you?”
“Yes, I want you.” Peter’s strong fingers closed over her outstretched hand. “Judy, it was my big chance, and I muffed it. I let him get away.”
“Don’t try to talk about it—unless you want to,” Judy told him gently. “You’re still very weak. You must save your strength.”
“You’re right.” He was quiet for a moment just looking at Judy as if he could never see enough of her.
“You’re always—so brave,” he said at last.
Judy didn’t feel very brave. She felt like bursting into tears again. Little by little she heard how Peter had been brought to the hospital unconscious from loss of blood. They had given him a transfusion before the operation. That was why it had taken so long. Removing the bullet, he said, was a simple matter. It had been imbedded in the flesh close to his shoulder blade.
“I’ll be as good as new in a day or so,” he assured Judy, who sat beside his bed, ready to listen whenever he felt like talking. “My partner cornered most of the gang. They were better organized than we thought. We trailed this man—”
“What man?” Judy asked when Peter paused.
“His name’s Clarence Lawson. I can tell you about it now. It’s public knowledge. The public has to be warned against such characters,” he continued. “It all started when a woman came into our New York office and said her church had never received a donation she had given a man who claimed to be on the Ways and Means Committee. He’d enlisted her sympathy and talked her into donating quite a substantial sum to what she thought was the building fund. Lawson had joined the church and gained the confidence of a number of influential people.”