The Splendid Outcast. Gibbs George

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СКАЧАТЬ cannot deny valor," she said coolly. "It is the greatest thing in the world."

      She wanted no misunderstandings. She only wanted Harry Horton to know that love was not for her or for him. The fakir under the bed clothes understood. She preferred to speak of valor. Valor! If she only knew!

      Jim Horton gathered courage. If he wasn't to tell the truth he would have to play his part.

      "Everybody is brave – out there," he said, with a gesture.

      "But not brave enough for mention," said Quinlevin genially. "It won't do, Harry boy. A hero ye were and a hero ye'll remain."

      Horton felt the girl's calm gaze upon his face.

      "I'm so glad you've made good, Harry. I am. And I want you to believe it."

      "Thanks," he muttered.

      Why did she gaze at him so steadily? It almost seemed as though she had read his secret. He hoped that she had. It would have simplified things enormously. But she turned away with a smile.

      "You're to come to us, of course, as soon as they let you out," she said quietly.

      "Well, rather," laughed Quinlevin.

      The nurse had approached and the girl Moira had moved to the foot of the bed. Barry Quinlevin paused a moment, putting a slip of paper in Horton's hand.

      "Well, au revoir, old lad. In a few days again – "

      The wounded man's gaze followed the girl. She smiled back once at him and then followed the nurse down the ward. Jim Horton sank back into his pillows with a gasp.

      "Well – now you've done it. Now you have gone and done it," he muttered.

      CHAPTER II

      THE MYSTERY DEEPENS

      In a courageous moment, a day or so later, the patient requested Nurse Newberry to try to get what information she could as to the whereabouts of his cousin, Corporal James Horton, B Company, – th Engineers, and waited with some impatience and anxiety the result of her inquiries. She discovered that Corporal James Horton had been last seen in the fight for Boissière Wood, but was now reported as missing.

      Missing!

      The blank expression on the face of her patient was rather pitiful.

      "It probably means that he's a prisoner. He may be all right. H.Q. is pretty cold-blooded with its information."

      But the patient knew that Corporal Horton wasn't a prisoner. If he was missing, it was because he had gone to the rear – nothing less than a deserter. Nevertheless the information, even indefinite as it was, brought him comfort. He clung rather greedily to its very indefiniteness. In the eyes of the army or of the world "missing" meant "dead" or "prisoner," and until Harry revealed himself, the good name of the corporal of Engineers was safe. That was something.

      And the information brought the wounded man abruptly to the point of realizing that he was now definitely committed to play the role he had unwittingly chosen. He had done his best to explain, but they hadn't listened to him. And when confronted with the only witnesses whose opinions seemed to matter (always excepting Harry himself), he had miserably failed in carrying out his first intentions. He tried to think of the whole thing as a joke, but he found himself confronted with possibilities which were far from amusing.

      The slate-blue Irish eyes of Harry's war-bride haunted him. They were eyes meant to be tender and yet were not. Her fine lips were meant for the full throated laughter of happiness, and yet had only wreathed in faint uncertain smiles.

      Barry Quinlevin was a less agreeable figure to contemplate. If Jim Horton hadn't read his letter to Harry he would have found it easier to be beguiled by the man's genial air of good fellowship and sympathy, but he couldn't forget the incautious phrases of that communication, and having first formed an unfavorable impression, found no desire to correct it.

      To his surprise it was Moira who came the following week to the hospital at Neuilly on visitors' day. Jim Horton had decided on a course of action, but when she approached his bed, all redolent with the joy of out of doors, he quite forgot what he meant to say to her. In Moira, too, he seemed to feel an effort to do her duty to him with a good grace, which almost if not quite effaced the impression of her earlier visit. She took his thin hand in her own for a moment while she examined him with a kindly interest, which he repaid with a fraternal smile.

      "Father sent me in his place," she said. "I've put him to bed with a cold."

      "I'm so glad – " said Horton, and then stopped with a short laugh. "I mean – I'm glad you're here. I'm sorry he's ill. Nothing serious?"

      "Oh, no. He's a bit run down, that's all. And you – you're feeling better?"

      He liked the soft way she slithered over the last syllable.

      "Oh, yes – of course."

      All the while he felt her level gaze upon him, cool and intensely serious.

      "You are out of danger entirely, they tell me. I see they've taken the bandage off."

      "Yesterday," he said. "I'm coming along very fast."

      "I'm glad."

      "They promise before long that I can get out into the air in a wheel-chair."

      "That will do you all the good in the world."

      In spite of himself, he knew that his eyes were regarding her too intently, noting the well modeled nose, the short upper lip, firm red mouth and resolute chin, all tempered with the softness of youth and exquisite femininity. He saw her chin lowered slightly as her gaze dropped and turned aside while the slightest possible compression of her lips indicated a thought in which he could have no share.

      "I have brought you some roses," she said quietly.

      "They are very beautiful. They will remind me of you until you come again."

      The sudden raising of her eyes as she looked at him over the blossoms was something of a revelation, for they smiled at him with splendid directness.

      "You are improving," she laughed, "or you've a Blarney Stone under the pillow. I can't remember when you've said anything so nice as that at all."

      He was thoughtful for a moment.

      "Perhaps I have a new vision," he said at last. "The bullet in my head may have helped. It has probably affected my optic nerve."

      She smiled with him.

      "You really do seem different, somehow," she broke in. "I can't exactly explain it. Perhaps it's the pallor that makes the eyes look dark and your voice – it's softer – entirely."

      "Really – !" he muttered, uncomfortably, his gaze on the gray blanket. "Well, you see, I suppose it's what I've been through. My eyes would seem darker, wouldn't they, against white, and then my voice – er – it isn't very strong yet."

      "Yes, that's it," she replied.

      Her eyes daunted him from his purpose a little, and he knew that he would have to use extreme caution, but he had resolved whatever came to see the game through. After all, if she discovered his secret, it was only what he had tried in СКАЧАТЬ