Nona then walked along by one side of Captain Castaigne’s chair, with Lieutenant Hume on the other, while old François pushed nobly in the rear.
The French officer made no effort to hide his annoyance at Barbara’s frankness. He was still weak and sometimes a little querulous after his long illness.
“Miss Meade does not understand, she does not appreciate Miss Paybodé,” he began. “Even my mother, although she is on her knees to my friend because of her great kindness to me, even she cannot see all that Eugenié has been, all that she is----”
This appeared to be a conversation of unfinished sentences, of things better left unsaid, for Captain Castaigne now looked as if he would give a great deal to have kept his last remark to himself.
However, Nona Davis had the exquisite tact of many southern girls and apparently had heard only the first part of her host’s speech.
“Oh, you must not misunderstand Barbara and Eugenia,” she explained. “Most of the time they disagree on every subject. But the truth is they are really tremendously fond of each other. Why, now that Mildred Thornton is in Paris with her brother Dick, I feel quite left out. Barbara used to weep for Eugenia every night after we made our escape with your mother and François through the passage under the chateau. You see when we learned that she was not with Mildred, but had been left behind, naturally we supposed that something dreadful had happened to her. And of course Barbara understood how self-sacrificing Eugenia always is and feared she had given her life for some one else. If you only knew how happy we all were when we finally learned that you were both alive and that Eugenia was caring for you!”
“But how did you hear?” Lieutenant Hume demanded. The little party had now almost reached the garden where the table was spread for their entertainment, so there was but little time for Nona’s story.
“Oh, we heard through a little French girl, Nicolete. You see, she came to the farmhouse one day to see Eugenia, and after they had talked a while Eugenia discovered that she was a friend of Captain Castaigne’s. Then she told her that he was in hiding. After that Nicolete used to come every day and bring supplies and seemed devoted to Eugenia. Well, you remember Madame told you how François finally made his way back to this neighborhood to try and find out what had become of Captain Castaigne. You see the Countess was in despair, as naturally we all believed that Captain Castaigne had been killed or taken prisoner, but François would not give up. He was unkindly treated by the Germans when he first came home, but afterwards they allowed him to work for them. Then of course he saw Nicolete and she told him what had happened. So we actually knew where Eugenia and Captain Castaigne were before we were able to get back here. But you can imagine how anxious we used to feel for fear they would be discovered and something dreadful done to both of them!”