I echoed the boy's words: "You, too, are a patriot!"
"I was," she said, gravely, and sauntered away.
I went unhappily to Paris. Would that another stranger could chance along, to whom the boy might unburden his heart,—his noble heart, filled not only with dreams of military glory, but of plans for the protection of the weak and helpless among his countrymen!
A week later a telegram from the princess summoned me to Orléans. To my surprise, she met me on the staircase of Mrs. Greyshield's house.
"You are right!" she whispered. "Mrs. Greyshield is to lose her boy!"
My first feeling was one of anger. "Do not speak of such a thing!" I said, harshly.
"Come and see," and she led the way to a room where the weary-faced lad lay on a huge, canopied bed, a nursing sister on either side of him.
"The doctors are in consultation below," she murmured; "but there is no hope."
