That was all.  More than evasive.  Subtly calculated to make her believe that he had dismissed all thought of Jack and was immersed in his own affairs.  She sat staring and helpless, a cold horror creeping into her heart and a nameless terror taking outline in her senses.  Hideous alternative.  To be coherent she must suspect, nay, accuse, her father of a dreadful duplicity.  He was deceiving her; else why no mention of his mission to Washington—­his abduction of Jones?  Jones!  Who was he?  Oh, blind and senseless that she had been!  Why had she not asked the young men at Georgetown to describe Jones?  That would have revealed all she needed to know.  Was it too late to write them?  Yes; but could she throw suspicion upon her father by writing to strangers, and of necessity exposing the sinister secrecy of her father’s action.  But she could hurry back to Washington, and, without letting the young men know, got a descriptive list.  This she resolved to do.  Twenty-four hours later she was in Washington.  The journey was thrown away.  The descriptive list had been sent by the hospital steward with the invalid.  He could be found in the military hospital in Warchester.  His name was Leander Elkins.  This was something gained.  Two days later she was at the hospital in Warchester.  The steward, Elkins, came to her in the waiting room.  He was a young giant in stature, with light flaxen hair, a merry blue eye, and so bashful in the presence of a woman that he colored rosily as Kate asked him if he was the person she had sent for.

“Yes’m.  I’m Lee Elkins,” he stammered, very much perplexed to find ease for his large hands and ample feet.

“Are you—­is Mr. Jones, who came from the Georgetown Hospital, in your case?” Kate had thought out her course in advance, and had decided that the direct way was the best.  Unless the man had been charged to conceal facts, an apparent knowledge of Jones’s movements would be the surest way of eliciting his whereabouts.

“Oh no, miss.  Jones wa’nt brought here; he was took to a private place.  I don’t rightly know where, but I calculate I ken find eout of ye want to know.”

“Yes, I should like very much to know.  I am deeply interested in him, Did you have charge of him?”

“I can’t say I did.  I was sent from Washington in the same train, but the old chap that got Jones removed did all the nussing.  I only got a sight of him as he was lifted into the carriage.”

“Should you know him again if you saw him?”

“Think I should.  Yes’m, think I should.  His head was about as big as a pumpkin.”

“He had been wounded?”

“Well, I should say so.”

“Have you seen the gentleman that brought him on from Washington lately?”

“Not here, mum; I did see him in the street the other day.  He was in a wagon—­leastwise, it looked mighty like him.”

Kate began to breathe more freely.  Her father had, at least, avoided any collusion with inferiors.  His handiwork had been natural, involving no conspiracy or bribing of menials.