Miss Patricia opened the attack with her usual vigor.
“What do you mean, Sally, by going off this afternoon, knowing that I particularly needed your help? You must understand that it is highly improper for a young girl to tramp about over this French country alone. Even if Polly Burton has permitted you Camp Fire girls the most extraordinary amount of freedom, she surely has realized this and warned you against such indiscretion. There is no way of guessing into what difficulty you may have already managed to entangle yourself!”
Sally felt herself flushing until her clear skin was suffused with glowing color.
“I am sorry, Miss Patricia,” she said, “but remember that I am not a child and cannot have you speak to me as if I were a disobedient one. I have been for a walk and—”
But fortunately Sally was not required to complete her sentence. Suddenly Mrs. Burton had appeared out of her bedroom and began to hurry downstairs.
“Sally!” she called with a suggestion of appeal in her voice. “The excitement over your disappearance is my fault, so please don’t you and Aunt Patricia quarrel. A little while ago when I returned home and Mère ’Toinette told me that you had gone out alone and she did not know in what direction, why, I became uneasy. You will not again, will you? Really I am afraid it is not safe for you children, although with me of course the case is different. Aunt Patricia is not disposed to think so, forgetting my advanced age. Still, Sally, no matter how enthusiastic we may feel over our work here in the shell-torn area of France, we must remember these are war times when one never knows what may happen next. Besides, the French do not always understand our American ideas of liberty for young girls.”
By this time having reached the foot of the stairs, Mrs. Burton slipped her hand inside Sally’s, glancing back with a slightly amused and slightly apologetic expression toward Miss Patricia.
“Really, Aunt Patricia, I do regret your being so annoyed, yet you must not take my news too seriously. Our guests are sure not to remain with us long.”
To the latter part of her Camp Fire guardian’s remark Sally Ashton paid not the slightest heed, so concerned was she with the first part of her speech.
Why of all times should this question of her personal liberty come up for discussion this afternoon? Of her own free choice Sally felt convinced that she would never willingly go out alone. Nevertheless, how was she to keep her word to the young soldier unless she returned next day to the château? with the food she had promised him and without confiding the fact to any one else? Oh, why had she allowed herself to be drawn into this reckless promise? At this moment if she could only slip into her Camp Fire guardian’s room and ask her advice! Miss Patricia would insist that if the soldier were a deserter he straightway should be brought to justice. But Sally understood her Camp Fire guardian well enough to appreciate that, once hearing the soldier in hiding was ill and wounded, she would be as reluctant as Sally herself to follow her manifest duty.