Her surprised regard challenged him. “You seem very certain,” she observed.
Jeremy recovered himself. “I had heard rumors, but nothing formal,” he said. “I thought perhaps you would have told me when it was announced.”
“I assumed that you knew.”
What Miss Pritchard meant was, “I assumed that she would have told you.” She perceived that there were depths in this affair of which she knew little or nothing.
“German betrothals are curious and formal things in her class,” continued the old maid. “When she came here, to ‘see America first,’ I believe it was understood that nothing was to be settled until her return. She went back, and the formalities were arranged. At the outbreak of war her fiancé was somewhere in Africa and, I believe, is still there.”
“I see,” said Jeremy dully.
“Marcia still sees The Guardian.” The spirit of romance in the spinster heart would force the words.
“I know. And that helps. Good-bye and thank you.”
“Come to see me and let’s be friends again,” said the warm-hearted lady.
Most of that night Jeremy spent on the tramp, thinking of The Guardian in terms of Marcia’s letter; haggardly struggling to harmonize cross-interests, cross-purposes, cross-loyalties. Out of the struggle emerged one clear resolve. What next the progress of the war should produce that intimately touched his conscience, should be the signal, the release. Upon that The Guardian should speak its owner’s mind though damnation follow.