“Is he asleep?” Amherst asked, as Miss Brent joined him.
Miss Brent glanced at him again. His voice betokened not merely education, but something different and deeper—the familiar habit of gentle speech; and his shabby clothes—carefully brushed, but ill-cut and worn along the seams—sat on him easily, and with the same difference.
“The morphine has made him drowsy,” she answered. “The wounds were dressed about an hour ago, and the doctor gave him a hypodermic.”
“The wounds—how many are there?”
“Besides the hand, his arm is badly torn up to the elbow.”
Amherst listened with bent head and frowning brow.
“What do you think of the case?”
She hesitated. “Dr. Disbrow hasn’t said–-“
“And it’s not your business to?” He smiled slightly. “I know hospital etiquette. But I have a particular reason for asking.” He broke off and looked at her again, his veiled gaze sharpening to a glance of concentrated attention. “You’re not one of the regular nurses, are you? Your dress seems to be of a different colour.”
She smiled at the “seems to be,” which denoted a tardy and imperfect apprehension of the difference between dark-blue linen and white.
“No: I happened to be staying at Hanaford, and hearing that they were in want of a surgical nurse, I offered my help.”
Amherst nodded. “So much the better. Is there any place where I can say two words to you?”
“I could hardly leave the ward now, unless Mrs. Ogan comes back.”
“I don’t care to have you call Mrs. Ogan,” he interposed quickly. “When do you go off duty?”
She looked at him in surprise. “If what you want to ask about is—anything connected with the management of things here—you know we’re not supposed to talk of our patients outside of the hospital.”
“I know. But I am going to ask you to break through the rule—in that poor fellow’s behalf.”
A protest wavered on her lip, but he held her eyes steadily, with a glint of good-humour behind his determination. “When do you go off duty?”
“At six.”
“I’ll wait at the corner of South Street and walk a little way with you. Let me put my case, and if you’re not convinced you can refuse to answer.”
“Very well,” she said, without farther hesitation; and Amherst, with a slight nod of farewell, passed through the door near which they had been standing.
II
WHEN Justine Brent emerged from the Hope Hospital the October dusk had fallen and the wide suburban street was almost dark, except when the illuminated bulk of an electric car flashed by under the maples.
She crossed the tracks and approached the narrower thoroughfare where Amherst awaited her. He hung back a moment, and she was amused to see that he failed to identify the uniformed nurse with the girl in her trim dark dress, soberly complete in all its accessories, who advanced to him, smiling under her little veil.
“Thank you,” he said as he turned and walked beside her. “Is this your way?”
“I am staying in Oak Street. But it’s just as short to go by Maplewood Avenue.”
“Yes; and quieter.”
For a few yards they walked on in silence, their long steps falling naturally into time, though Amherst was somewhat taller than his companion.
At length he said: “I suppose you know nothing about the relation between Hope Hospital and the Westmore Mills.”
“Only that the hospital was endowed by one of the Westmore family.”
“Yes; an old Miss Hope, a great-aunt of Westmore’s. But there is more than that between them—all kinds of subterranean passages.” He paused, and began again: “For instance, Dr. Disbrow married the sister of our manager’s wife.”
“Your chief at the mills?”
“Yes,” he said with a slight grimace. “So you see, if Truscomb—the manager—thinks one of the mill-hands is only slightly injured, it’s natural that his brother-in-law, Dr. Disbrow, should take an optimistic view of the case.”
“Natural? I don’t know–-“
“Don’t you think it’s natural that a man should be influenced by his wife?”
“Not where his professional honour is concerned.”
Amherst smiled. “That sounds very young—if you’ll excuse my saying so. Well, I won’t go on to insinuate that, Truscomb being high in favour with the Westmores, and the Westmores having a lien on the hospital, Disbrow’s position there is also bound up with his taking—more or less—the same view as Truscomb’s.”
Miss Brent had paused abruptly on the deserted pavement.
“No, don’t go on—if you want me to think well of you,” she flashed out.
Amherst met the thrust composedly, perceiving, as she turned to face him, that what she resented was not so
