"Kitty," he said, breaking the tableau, "what are you doing here?"
"You've been hurt! There is blood on you!"
"A trifling cut. But I'm hurt, nevertheless, that you should be so
thoughtless as to come here against my orders. It doesn't matter that
Karlov has given up the idea of having you followed. But for the sake
of us all you must be made to understand that we are dealing with high
explosives and poison gas. It's not what might happen to me or to Uncle
Sam's business. It's you. Any moment they may take it into their heads
to get at me and Hawksley through you. That's why we watch over you. You
don't want to see Hawksley done in, do you? It's real tragedy, Kitty,
and nobody can guess what the end is going to be."
Kitty's lip quivered. "Cutty, if you talk like that to me I shall cry."
"Good Lord, what about?"--bewildered.
"About everything. I've been on the verge of hysterics all day."
"Kitty, you poor child, what's happened?"
"Nothing--everything. Lonesome. When I saw all those mothers and wives
and sisters and sweethearts on the curb to-day, watching their boys
march by, it hit me hard. I was alone. Nobody. So please don't be cross
with me. I'm on the ragged edge. Silly, I know. But we women often go
to pieces over nothing, without any logical reason. Ready to face murder
and battle and sudden death; and then to blow up, as you men say it,
over nothing. I had to move, go somewhere, do something; so I came
here. But I came on--what do you call it?--official business. Here!" She
offered him the wallet.
"What's this?"
"Belongs to Johnny Two-Hawks. He hid it that night behind my flatirons
on the range. Why, Cutty, he's rich!"
"Did he show the contents?"
"Only the money and the bonds. He said if he had died the money and
bonds would have been mine.
"Providing Gregor was also dead." Cutty looked into the wallet, but
disturbed nothing. "I imagine these funds are actually Gregor's."
"He told me to give the wallet to you. And so I waited. I fell asleep.
So please don't scold me."
"I'm a brute! But it's because you've become so much to me that I was
angry. You're Tommy and Molly's girl, and I've got to watch out for you
until you reach some kind of a port."