So Nona and Barbara started toward Madame Bonnèt’s tiny house, leaving Lieutenant Kelley talking to Duke and trying to make friends with him. The great dog was friendly enough, but not disposed toward intimacies.
Just outside the door the two girls stopped. Someone was about to open it, perhaps having heard their approach.
The next moment Jeanne stepped out, leading her friend as she always did. But at the sight of Barbara and Nona she left him standing a moment alone and came forward, giving her hand to Nona, but fixing her eyes upon Barbara Thornton.
“It was you who told me to do my best to help my Captain find his friends. I did not forget. When we could manage we slipped away from our convalescent hospital without saying good-bye, as we would have been forbidden to leave. Since then we have traveled many miles, yet nothing has come of it.” She gave a tiny shrug of her childish shoulders, half as an expression of philosophy, half as an acknowledgment of defeat.
“But isn’t the Captain himself better?” Nona inquired, although convinced beforehand of the truth.
The French soldier, whom, as an act of courtesy both to him and to his guardian, everyone spoke of as “Captain,” remained in the same spot Jeanne had placed him, his head hanging down and with a great bandage tied over the upper part of his face. As a matter of fact, he was thinner and more shrunken and vaguer than before he and Jeanne had started upon their pilgrimage. But then they had walked so far, reached so many strange places and so many questions had been asked of him, impossible for him to answer! More than ever was the French soldier dependent on the touch of Jeanne’s little hand.
And she, for the moment, had deserted him!
Then, for a brief time, Nona and Barbara and Lieutenant Kelley were overcome with surprise and consternation. It chanced that Jeanne did not notice at once or she might never have allowed the thing to take place.
Lieutenant Kelley had remained where he was in the lower part of the garden, allowing Barbara and Nona to have their meeting with Jeanne undisturbed. As a precaution he had placed his hand on Duke’s collar, thinking perhaps the dog might frighten the little girl, or more likely, since it was difficult to associate timidity with Jeanne, that he might startle her companion.
Suddenly, when he was not anticipating any action on Duke’s part, the dog had looked at him with an expression which was imploring and at the same time savage. Afterwards, he had broken away and with a few leaps had crossed the small space of the garden, making directly for the injured soldier.