She made a little movement, as if to take hold of his hands: but in an instant she stepped back a pace and said:
"Don't fear about me. I can take care of myself. I'm all right. You'd better return to the fort as quickly as you can. It is your country, your flag, not me, that you must think of now."
She folded her arms and stood boldly erect.
Never before, in all his life, had he felt such a rebuke. He gave her a straight, strong look in the eyes.
"You are right, Alice." he cried, and rushed from the house to the fort.
She held her rigid attitude for a little while after she heard him shut the front gate of the yard so forcibly that it broke in pieces, then she flung her arms wide, as if to clasp something, and ran to the door; but Beverley was out of sight. She turned and dropped into a chair. Jean came to her out of the next room. His queer little face was pale and pinched; but his jaw was set with the expression of one who has known danger and can meet it somehow.
"Are they going to scalp us?" he half whispered presently, with a shuddering lift of his distorted shoulders.
Her face was buried in her hands and she did not answer. Childlike he turned from one question to another inconsequently.
"Where did Papa Roussillon go to?" he next inquired. "Is he going to fight?"
She shook her head.