“Merely as a volunteer, and when the regular nurses were especially busy. Major Brennan was stationed there for some time when I first visited him, and I felt it my duty as a loyal woman to aid the poor fellows.”
“It was surely far from being an agreeable task to one of your refinement.”
“Oh, it was not that that made it so hard,” and her eyes were upon me now unflinchingly. “It was the constant sight of so much misery one was unable to relieve. Besides, that was nearly a year ago; I was very young, just from school, and every form of suffering was new and terrible to me.”
“I greatly wonder you were permitted to go there at all.”
“The Major did object. He insisted it was no fit place for me, and that I ran the risk of contracting disease. But I generally have my own way, even with him, and in this case I felt it a duty to my country, and that I was right in my decision.”
I remained silent, striving vainly to frame some innocent question which should solve for me the problem of who and what she was. Suddenly she spoke softly:
“Captain Wayne, I feel I owe you an apology for my unwarranted and unladylike conduct last night. I am very sure now that you are a gentleman, and will appreciate how bitterly I was tried, how deeply I have ever since regretted it.”
It hurt her pride to say even this much, as I could tell by her downcast eyes and heaving bosom, and I hastened to relieve her embarrassment.
“You have nothing whatever to ask forgiveness for,” I said earnestly. “Rather such a request should come from me. I only trust, Miss Brennan, that you will excuse my part in this extremely unfortunate affair.”
She sat looking down upon her plate, her fingers nervously crumbling a bit of corn bread.