“It is the fairy story of the ‘Sleeping Beauty’ backwards,” he began, without the least betrayal of amusement or surprise. “You see, our positions really ought to be reversed. You should be sleeping here. Then I should not in the least mind behaving as the Prince did when he woke the lovely Princess. He kissed her, I believe.”
Nona was startled and a little frightened. But one could not be frightened of a boy who must have been terribly injured and was now trying to fight his way back to life with what gayety he could.
“Are you the gardener’s son?” she asked, a little after Eugenia’s manner and really quite foreign to her own. She had never seen a young man with such blue eyes as this one had, nor such queer brown hair that seemed to have been burned to red in spots.
“I am a son of Adam,” he answered, still grave as ever, “and he was, I have been told, the earth’s first gardener. Now tell me: Are you a Princess?”
The girl smiled a little more graciously. She had possessed very few boy friends and certainly no one of them had ever talked to her in this fashion. However, it was amusing and if it entertained the young fellow there could be no harm in their talking. Nona Davis had the poise and understanding that came of gentle birth.
So she shook her golden head gravely.
“I am not a Princess, I am sorry to spoil your fairy story. No, I am just an American girl who has come over to try and be a little useful with the Red Cross work. My friends and I met the Countess of Sussex the other day and she was kind enough to ask us down to see her place before we leave for the front.”
During her speech the young man had been attempting to get himself off the ground by rising on his elbow. But even with this movement he must have wrenched his wounded leg, for immediately after he dropped back again, and although suppressing a groan, Nona could see that perspiration had broken out on his thin temples and on his smooth boyish lips.
The next instant she was down on her knees at his side. He had gotten into an abominably awkward position so that his head hung over the pillows instead of resting upon them.
How often Nona had assisted her old father in a like difficulty!