“It’s no offense,” she said. “You see, how can it be, when I am half American. I didn’t know but Colonel Gunn had told you. My mother was an American, from Baltimore. That is why I was so willing to come to America. And I mean to visit Baltimore as soon as I can.”
From this agreeable topic, the talk switched to the Hindu and Kadir Dhin, a change inevitable, as that had been Chip’s reason, or excuse, for making this call.
“Colonel Gunn is sure that Gunga Singh, the man who slew my father, is still here, and that he is committing these burglaries,” she reported. “Colonel Gunn believes he has found refuge with some of the low foreigners in the mill sections, and is burglarizing that he may have money to pay for concealment. He says, too, that Dickey would keep him, would keep any scoundrel, for money. I feel as if I were sitting on a volcano. I don’t go out any more.”
Then she spoke again of Kadir Dhin, declaring that it was too had the young Hindu’s career at Fardale had been shadowed as it was.
She added:
“It has come to Colonel Gunn, and he resents it, that you have been hinting that perhaps Kadir Dhin isn’t so innocent as he seems—that he has been helping Gunga Singh.”
Chip had more than hinted that to his friends—but only to his friends; and he had believed it. He thought he had reasons for believing it.
“Somebody must be a mind reader,” he said.
“You didn’t say it?”
“I said it to Clancy and Kess and perhaps one or two more.”