Tink set the point of the pen on the paper and Jing lifted the other end in the air. Panting heavily Tink scratched out the name of Corporal Reynolds and wrote in the name of Private James Donavon. When he completed the job he was worn out, but he had the virtuous satisfaction of having completed the first step in his plan.
“Now what?” Jing asked, when they replaced the pen.
“Now we head for the village and the home of Mayor McCarthy and his daughter, Eileen: Private Donavon should arrive there in an hour or so to pick up the Captain’s equipment. We want to be there then...
The interior of the McCarthy home, a pleasant, well-furnished cottage, was well lighted by the streaming morning sun, when Tink and Jing arrived and settled themselves on the mantel to await developments.
They did not have to wait long. In fifteen or twenty minutes the front door bell rang, and from the rear of the house a big, red-faced, white-haired man emerged to answer it.
“That’s Mayor McCarthy,” Jing informed Tink.
The Mayor jerked open the door and the scowl on his face deepened as he saw the uniformed figure standing there.
“Well?” he demanded truculently.
The soldier in the doorway removed his hat.
“Sorry to trouble you, sir,” he said, “but I’ve come for Captain Donavon’s gear.”
“That’s Private Donavon,” Tink whispered.
“You mean, you hope it is,” Jing said.
The beet-red face of the Mayor looked ready to explode. The soldier in the doorway was shifting uneasily.
“So you’ve come for Captain Donavon’s gear, have you?” he roared. “Well you can take it and good riddance. I don’t want anything of that man’s contaminating my house. And you can tell your Captain for me if I see him on my premises again I’ll set the dogs on him.”
The soldier in the doorway was a mouse-like little man with scraggly black hair and pale cheeks. He looked very frightened.
“Yes sir,” he gulped, “I’ll tell him.”
“Dad!” a clear feminine voice called from the rear of the housie. “Ask the soldier to come in. I’ll give him C–Captain Donavon’s things in just a minute.”
Jing nudged Tink.
“That’s Eileen,” she whispered.
The soldier entered the front room of the cottage, twisting his cap in his hands, and the sputtering Mayor stamped wrath fully to the rear of the house.
Tink smiled contentedly. Things were working nicely.
In a minute a slim, beautiful, darkhaired Irish girl entered the room. Her face was pale and haunted with deep purple shadows under great, lovely eyes. She carried a belt, a military tunic and several sheafs of letters and reports in her arms.
“This is all I could find in the Captain’s room,” she said to the soldier, as she shifted the objects to his hands.
“Thank you, Miss. I’m sure everything’s here.”
The soldier shifted awkwardly from foot to foot and stared miserably at the pale, unhappy girl. He started for the door, then paused and turned.
“And,” he blurted, “I’ll tell him how nice you’ve been and everything.”
The girl smiled wanly.
“I wouldn’t bother,” she said. “I’m sure he wouldn’t care one way or the other.”
“That’s where you’re wrong, Miss,” the soldier said earnestly. “I mean, he cares a lot about people and everybody. And he’d want to know if anybody put themselves out on his account. He’s like that. That’s why he’s best C.O. in this man’s army.”
“Is he?” the girl said, a little breathlessly.
“Why sure,” the soldier said enthusiastically. “Everybody likes the Captain.” He paused and looked at the melting glint in the girl’s eyes. “That is,” he added cautiously, “almost everybody likes him.”
Tink squeezed Jing’s hand hopefully. “Things are going fine,” he whispered.
Jing didn’t answer. Instead she pointed to the door which was open an inch or so. “We have company,” she said.
Tink glanced at the door and his bright confidence faded.
Nastee stood in the crack of the door, a ghoulish smile on his puckered little features. He crossed the floor and swung himself up to the mantel with the aid of a dangling tassel that hung from the mantel drapery.
He sat down next to Jing. His sharp gleaming eyes were alight with sly speculation as he looked swiftly from Tink to Jing.
“What’s going on here?” he demanded.
“Nothing at all,” Tink said hastily. Nastee’s sharp eyes swung to the Irish lass and the soldier standing in the center of the room. The soldier was extolling the merits of the Captain and the girl was listening, a rapt gleam in her eye.
“Oh, ho,” Nastee said. “So that’s your game. Soften the girl up by filling her full of stories about the Captain, eh?” He grinned nastily. “I can fix that, just you wait and see. I’ll remind her of a story about the Captain that isn’t so pleasant.”’
Before Tink could stop him he hopped down from the mantel and scurried across to a table that was set against the wall. He shinnied up the gnarled table leg and kicked back the knitted covering that protected the surface of the table.
A letter was visible against the gleaming mohogany.
“Hai ha!” he laughed. “This is the letter that caused all the trouble. Watch what happens when the girl is reminded of her dear Captain’s wife and five, maybe six, brats.”
Jing started to cry out, but Tink squeezed her arm.
“Give him enough rope,” he whispered.
With another malicious giggle Nastee drew back his foot and kicked the letter into the air. It fluttered to the ground at the feet of the girl.
She picked it up and stared at it for a long moment, her face hardening and the light fading from her eyes.
“I almost forgot this,” she said bitterly. “Your Captain may be all you say, but as far as I’m concerned he’s the lowest type of “creature on this earth!”
Nastee was holding his sides in a paroxysm of glee.
“What did I tell you?” he chortled, between gasps.
But Tink was watching the soldier and he saw the man reach out with an incredulous look on his face and take the letter from the girl.
“Why, Miss,” he said in a startled voice, “where did this come from?” Without waiting for a reply he slipped the letter from the envelope and scanned it rapidly.
“It’s from Maisie!” he cried delightedly.
The girl was looking at him as if he’d gone mad.
“What are you talking about?” she said. “That letter belongs to Captain Donavon. You’ve no right to be reading it.”
“It’s from my wife, Maisie,” the soldier said rapturously. “It doesn’t belong to the Captain. He hasn’t got a wife.”
The girl’s eyes opened wide and her cheeks flushed red.
“You’re talking nonsense,” she said weakly. “You must be.”
The soldier was grinning widely.
“No I’m not, Miss. This letter must’ve come in with the last shipment of mail.” A dazed look spread over his face. “Lord! That was two months ago. Maybe I’ve got six kids now.”
The girl shook her head bewilderedly. “You c — can’t be telling the truth. What was the letter doing in the Captain’s room? And why was it addressed to him? Oh, you’re lying to me!”
“No, Miss, I’m not,” the soldier insisted. “The Captain had the letter for the very good reason that it’s his job to censor all mail, coming and going. And about it being addressed to him, why look again!”
The girl took the letter eagerly, but her shoulders slumped despairingly when she studied it.
“Right there in black and white,” she said accusingly. “It’s addressed to ‘James Donavon’.”
“Naturally,” the soldier said. “I’m James Donavon. Same name as the Captain. This ain’t the first time our mails got mixed up.”