Then a face and figure passed before the girl’s vision and in a flash she controlled the leaping of the hot blood to her cheeks.
Nona looked directly at Colonel Dalton.
“You have asked me a question I will not answer,” she returned quietly. “I do not, of course, know whether you have the right to force me, but I feel that I have no right to say a single word that would reflect on any man or woman at our hospital. What I could tell you would amount to nothing; it would only be guessing at best. For I have no actual reason for being suspicious of any one.”
“No actual reason?” Colonel Dalton repeated. “Have you any reason at all?”
“No,” Nona returned.
The Colonel glanced again at the papers in his hands. “Because you were so kind as to nurse me at the Sacred Heart Hospital and because I am aware of the noble work their nurses and doctors have been doing for the wounded, I want no evil gossip to surround you. Do not mention my errand, but say to your superintendent that I will call in person to see her tomorrow evening. Perhaps you are right in not betraying whomever it is you seem to suspect. Good-by.”
Colonel Dalton again bowed his head, and as another officer had entered the room to speak to him, Nona hurried out.
The same lieutenant escorted her back to her starting point, but once again Nona paid no attention to him. She was in a tumult of surprise, apprehension and sorrow. A spy at the Sacred Heart Hospital, what knowledge had Colonel Dalton to go upon? Yet he appeared convinced and was too wise a man to accept a suspicion without proof.
No intimate personal sorrow had ever disturbed Nona Davis more seriously. Yet these were days when one could not give way. She must continue with her work as if nothing had happened and Colonel Dalton had commanded that she confide in no one. Yet if she could only speak of his suspicion to one single person, perhaps her own fears might be dissipated, or else, or else—here Nona scarcely faced her own thought. Perhaps the telling might enable the offender to escape while there was still opportunity.
She was dazed and sick when her escort assisted her to alight for the second time. Yet she had a vague sensation that his eyes were gazing at her with a strange combination of amusement and sympathy. But of course she must have been dreaming, because after she had walked several yards away she thought she overheard him say, “Are you the gardener’s son?” And really she had no right to believe the young officer had suddenly lost his mind.