"A brainy fellow," observed Jim. "And that pretty nurse—Miss Melnotte was she called? I had an idea you were smitten there, Sandy, and smitten hard."
"You never can judge by looking at a toad how far he will hop," returned the aviator coolly. If he had partially confided in the tart Miss Trivett, he was not wearing his heart on his sleeve for everybody to read.
"Well," Jim said soberly, "a man in your position has no business to try to tie up any woman's affections."
The sailing of even a large ship from the port of New York was no longer, in these war times, a gala occasion or the beginning of a pleasant sea adventure for its passengers. In general, parties coming aboard to speed those sailing were discouraged. A crowd was no more allowed to gather on the dock.
For this reason, perhaps, Frank Sanderson did not make the discovery when he went aboard that on an upper deck forward was a bevy of girls whom he certainly would have recognized. Instead, he and Jim sat in his stateroom and smoked until just before the ship's departure.
It was a cheerful party that he missed, and Sue Blaine was the life of it.
"My dear Belinda!" she cried, "you were always one of the plucky ones. It makes poor little me feel like a hap'orth o' nothing! But two years of hospital slavery is enough for me. And just think of what you are going up against now! The French wounded will be worse than those poor fellows they brought us out of that subway explosion that time—do you remember?"
"I have thought of all that," Belinda said quietly. "I have thought of their need and what I can do to help them. Oh, yes, Sue—I have thought of it."
"Trust Miss Melnotte for being both calm and literal," laughed somebody.
"Goodness, yes!" cried the volatile Sue Blaine, yet looking at her friend admiringly. "But I don't see why you do it. If you were crossed in love, you couldn't be more desperate."