Nathalie turned the car around,—the man who had been following her had long since disappeared in the darkness,—and was soon speeding towards home. She glanced every now and then at the three figures on the back seat, who sat as still as three blind mice, snuggling up to each other for warmth, while the little chap at her side clutched her frantically as he lurched forward every time the car swung around a corner, or bumped over a “thank-you-ma’am.”
“Here, kiddie,” cried the girl presently, suddenly looking down at the child, whose big, reddish-brown eyes were staring up at her half fearfully from out of a wan, white face. “Put your head on my lap! There, that’s it,” as the child, to her surprise snuggled up to her, and then silently obeyed. “Now look up,” she added laughingly, “and count the stars.”
Although this injunction brought forth a chuckle from the back seat, it sufficed to keep the little one quiet, and the girl, as she drove rapidly on, could hear him droning, “One, two, three,—” until, with a drowsy little sigh, the counting ceased, and the girl saw that he was asleep.
It was almost nine o’clock when Nathalie whirled under the dimly burning lantern of the porte-cochère at Seven Pillars, where, on the veranda, Janet and her mother were anxiously watching for her.
“Oh, Nathalie, I have been so worried about you,” began her mother plaintively. “I will never let you go off this way again.” But her lamentations were cut short as her daughter cried, “Oh, it’s all right, mumsie; something happened to the car and detained me. But do help me get these hungry boys into the house, for the poor things are just dead with the long ride and for something to eat.”
Several minutes later, as the girl came hurrying from the kitchen, where she had been to see if the boys’ supper was ready, she found them lined up in the hall, four pathetically weary little figures. Their pale faces were smeared with railroad dust, and their foreheads oozed perspiration, but their eyes were bright and expectantly keen, on the alert for the something good that they knew was coming.
As her eyes swept smilingly down the line, the smile suddenly wavered, as her glance was arrested by the thin, emaciated face of a strange grayish whiteness,—of a peasant lad, who, bewildered with dumb amazement, was staring at her with a dogged look, his dark eyes haunted, as it were, by an expression of fear.
He was huddling something in his right arm, a yellowish-brown thing that squirmed and twisted uneasily, while the left sleeve of his soiled shirt-waist, strapped with one suspender, was pinned to his shoulder in an empty, flat way that was infinitely pathetic, for the little lad had only one arm!
The girl stared back at the boy with a suppressed cry, as into memory flashed the many stories she had heard of the Belgian and French children who had been so mercilessly ill-treated and maimed by the German soldiers. Oh, this must be one of those refugees. Yes, she dimly remembered now, seeing the word “Belgian” in Mrs. Van Vorst’s letter, which she had read so quickly. With sudden effort, her natural kindliness coming to her aid, she smiled into the fear-haunted eyes, crying gently, as she softly touched him on the one arm, “Is that your dog? Oh, I love dogs. What is his name?”
A sudden flash of joyful relief radiated from the boy’s face, momentarily driving away that dulled, cowlike bewilderment from his eyes. It was a look that caused Nathalie’s heart to quiver with pain, for it was the look of some dumb animal that had been wantonly punished or brutally hurt by the hand it loved; a look that haunted her for many days, constantly urging her to try and say something, or do something, so as to drive it away.