CHAPTER VI.
THE HAPPIEST GIRL.
Under the circumstances, there seemed to be nothing for Grail to do but await with what patience he could muster the return of Sergeant Cato; and as the afternoon slipped away with no report from the latter, he threw himself on a couch in the office at headquarters and presently drifted off into a dose. Worn out by his exertions, the strain he had been under, and his loss of sleep the night before, he was soon wrapped in a profound slumber; and, as nothing happened to disturb him, five o’clock still found him sleeping heavily.
Meanwhile, the train from Chicago, bearing the distressed daughter of the commandant, had arrived, and Major Appleby, who had gone down to meet her, could only return a gloomy shake of the head to the unspoken question of her wide, trouble-filled eyes.
“Don’t ask me anything now, my dear,” he said, in a low tone. “We are trying to keep the matter quiet for the present, and you can’t tell who might overhear us in this crowd. As soon as we get outside, though, you shall learn all there is to know. Mrs. Schilder is waiting for us in her car, and wants to take you to her home.”
“Mrs. Schilder?” The girl’s lips parted in a little gasp of surprise, for she had only a very slight acquaintance with the wife of the foundry manager.
“Yes,” the major explained. “Mrs. Appleby and I would have been delighted to have you with us, but it seemed preferable that you should not be at the fort, where you would be kept constantly upset by all sorts of unfounded rumors. So, as Mrs. Schilder pointed out that you would probably be more comfortable in her home than anywhere else, we accepted her invitation on your behalf.”
Miss Vedant hesitated a moment, then gave a slight shrug, as though to signify that it was a matter of indifference to her. Troubled and shaken as she was, she was in no mood to protest against any arrangement they might have made, and, anyway, it was too late now to draw back without seeming ungracious, for the major, by this time, was conducting her out through the tall, pillared entrance of the station, and she saw, a few steps away across the plaza, Mrs. Schilder waiting for them in the automobile.
Mrs. Schilder, modishly gowned, and undeniably beautiful, in a dark, foreign style, greeted the girl with just the proper touch of sympathetic restraint to put Meredith at her ease.
“I don’t want you to think me unduly urgent in this matter, my dear,” she said, “but I could not help feeling that if I were in your place I should want to be among friends who understood the situation. You must not regard yourself as a guest with us, either; you are to consider yourself at home, and do in all things just as you choose. At any rate,” she added, with a reassuring pressure of the hand, “give me the happiness of having you with me until your father is restored, which must certainly be within a few hours.”
Meredith glanced up eagerly. “You believe that?” she exclaimed, then turned as if for corroboration to Major Appleby, who sat with them in the tonneau.