Mollie’s startled eyes fastened to those of Vicky. She was always being surprised by the acute observation of this helter-skelter youngster. Of course she couldn’t know, but——
“Why don’t you marry him, now you’ve got a divorce?” the child rushed on with the ruthless innocence of her age.
The colour poured into Mollie’s cheeks. “How you talk!” she gasped. “About things you know nothing about. He—Colonel McClintock—has been a good friend to us. You mustn’t get foolish notions.”
“They’re not foolish.” She had Mollie in her arms once more. “Why don’t you marry him, dearest? I would. I’d snap him up. ’N him a hero—decorated for bravery, like the Enterprise said.”
Mollie’s eyes fell. “You mustn’t talk that way,” she breathed tremulously. “You’re only a girl, and you don’t know anything about it.”
“But I just do,” triumphed Vicky. “You think you’d stand in his way or somep’n now he’s a big officer. Or you think——”
“I think your imagination is too active, dear,” Mollie countered drily. “You haven’t the least reason to think there is anything but friendship between me and Colonel McClintock.”
Vicky caught her by the shoulders. “Sister Mollie, can you tell me, honest Injun, that you don’t love him?”
The gaze of Mollie wavered before the steady searching eyes of inexorable youth.
“Or that he doesn’t care for you?” Vicky went on.