CHAPTER XIV
A WARNING
It was the morning after the departure of Mrs. Burton and her guests and three days before the arrival of Ralph. Marshall for his visit at the farm house on the Aisne.
Having completed her work downstairs, Sally Ashton had hurried up to her bedroom where at present she was making little nervous preparations as if intending to go outdoors and anxious not to be observed.
There was no reason why she should feel alarmed. So far as she knew, every member of her household was occupied with the day’s work. From the schoolroom below she could hear the voices of the children singing a little French chanson, and now and then one of the older girls either asking a question or reciting. Alice Ashton and Bettina Graham, Marta Clark and Yvonne Fleury were engaged with their pupils.
An hour before Peggy and Vera had driven off in the motor with Mary Gilchrist, since Mary had promised to transport a number of wounded soldiers from a train to a nearby convalescent hospital, and was uncertain whether she would find anyone at the railroad station to help. Therefore she had asked the two girls to accompany her. Peggy also desired to mail a letter to Ralph Marshall which might reach him before he started upon his journey.
Always Aunt Patricia was occupied outdoors from breakfast until lunch time. So in spite of the fact that Sally Ashton showed a degree of suppressed excitement both in her manner and appearance, there would seem to have been no apparent excuse. A certain timorousness once wholly unlike her, lately had appeared in Sally’s attitude.
She also had grown thinner and her big golden brown eyes had lost their sleepy expression and acquired an anxious appeal. The lines about her full, rather pouting lips were strained and apprehensive.
Having at the moment pulled a small traveling bag down from a shelf overhead and allowed it to fall on the floor, Sally did not hear the swift opening and closing of her bedroom door. Therefore, when she had secured her bag and was straightening up, she gave an exclamation of surprise on discovering her sister standing within a few feet of her.
Except that she was handsomer, Alice looked very like her mother, the Esther of the first Camp Fire days, yet she and Sally bore no possible resemblance to each other either in disposition or appearance.
Alice was tall and slender, with a grave, severe air. She wore her dark red hair parted and bound about the back of her head in a heavy braid. She was a little angular. There was a suggestion that unless life dealt generously with her, granting her the gifts which make for tenderness and softness in a woman’s nature, she might in time have the appearance one is supposed to associate with an old maid. However, old maids are as unlike as the rest of the human species.