But if at their first accidental meeting in Paris the four American Red Cross girls had considered Captain Castaigne absurdly young for his captain’s commission, what must they have thought of him now? To Eugenia he appeared like a boy of sixteen.
It is true that he had a tiny dark moustache, but except for this his face remained smooth. Then his nurse had been compelled to cut off all his dark hair in order to cool his head, and his slender body had become wasted and his eyes sunken. Indeed, the features, which Eugenia had once considered too perfect for a man’s, now frequently made her think of a delicate cameo, when he lay with his face in profile against the pure white of his pillow.
Watching him on this night, which she feared might be his last, Eugenia felt unusually moved.
After all, he must have been a brave and capable fellow to have received his present rank in the French army while still so young. Moreover, there was a possibility that Captain Castaigne had more force of character than she had ever given him credit for. Had he not rebelled against his mother’s ideas of rank and dignity, and in spite of his devotion to her refused to keep his title in a country which was now a republic? Of course, Eugenia could not believe that the young man really had the true democratic spirit in which she so thoroughly trusted. Still there was a chance that he might not be so futile a character as she had first supposed.
Leaning over to wipe her patient’s face with a damp cloth, Eugenia made up her mind to one thing. If Captain Castaigne died she would go at once to the German colonel in command of the French village and confess what she had done. Of necessity she must be punished for her falsehood and treachery, but surely she would be permitted to send for the Countess Amélie at the last. The young French officer could be of no interest to his enemies after his death.
But where the Countess could be hiding, nor whom she could find to send for her, Eugenia had not the faintest idea. For these past two weeks she had been so entirely shut away from the outside world. Except for her one visit to the German colonel she had never left the little “House with the Blue Front Door” since the night she first brought her patient into it. Nor had Eugenia received a single line from any one of the other three Red Cross girls to afford her the faintest idea of what could have become of them. But she did not worry so much as she might have done at a time when she was less occupied. Besides, naturally she believed that the three girls were with the French field hospital at some point back of the line of the French army’s retreat.
