She caught the irony now more plainly in his voice. She continued
to stare at him.

"Why do you tell me this?"

"To warn you that you may be incurring the Colonel's displeasure.
If he had had his way, I should never have been allowed to dress
their wounds."

"And you thought, of course, that I must be of my uncle's mind?"
There was a crispness about her voice, an ominous challenging
sparkle in her hazel eyes.

"I'd not willingly be rude to a lady even in my thoughts," said he.
"But that you should bestow gifts on them, considering that if your
uncle came to hear of it...." He paused, leaving the sentence
unfinished. "Ah, well - there it is!" he concluded.

But the lady was not satisfied at all.

"First you impute to me inhumanity, and then cowardice. Faith!
For a man who would not willingly be rude to a lady even in his
thoughts, it's none so bad." Her boyish laugh trilled out, but the
note of it jarred his ears this time.

He saw her now, it seemed to him, for the first time, and saw how
he had misjudged her.

"Sure, now, how was I to guess that... that Colonel Bishop could