Part 30 (1/2)
”Is she in her right mind? can she recognize people?”
”Hardly yet; the fever is still on her, but she does not exhibit much delirium.”
”So the 'shock' is dead?”
”The unfortunate Mr. Hudson, if that is what you mean, is dead, but I don't consider the shock of seeing him was the real cause of your niece's illness. It would have come sooner or later without that.”
”Indeed! Then what do you consider was the cause, Dr. Duncan?”
”As I told you the last time you were here, Mrs. King, there is something on her mind.”
”There is,” said Catherine, ”and I think I know what it is.” She spoke irritably, as the thought of the love which she imagined existed between Mary and the barrister rose to her mind.
”And until that something is taken off her mind she will never recover,”
continued the doctor.
”The something is gone now, Dr. Duncan,” she said, looking straight into his eyes.
”I hope that is so,” he replied doubtfully.
”What a fool the man must be not to understand me,” thought Catherine; but the doctor had very good reasons to know that it was not love for Tom Hudson that weighed on the young girl's mind.
”Well! let us go and see Mary now,” she said.
The girl had been placed in a small private room by herself. When they came to it the door was opened by the nurse who was in charge of the patient.
Catherine looked keenly at the young woman, then turning to Dr. Duncan, exclaimed:
”I thought you told me the other day that Miss Riley was nursing my niece.”
”She has been nursing her,” replied the doctor, ”but we have sent her away for a holiday. She has been much overworked lately, and is far from well.”
”Indeed!” exclaimed Catherine.
”Yes, she is not at all well, and her anxiety about your niece, who is a great friend of hers, seems to have upset her very much.”
This information very much puzzled Catherine. ”Susan is not the person to get overworked and ill,” she reflected, ”and still less the person to get anxious about a friend, and she's gone off without giving me any notice. There is some mystery in all this, but I will get to the bottom of it.”
She entered the room and walked softly up to the side of the bed.
The room was darkened, but there was sufficient light to enable her to clearly distinguish the features of the sick girl.
Mary was lying there sleeping peacefully. She had been in this condition for some hours. It was the first natural and refres.h.i.+ng sleep that had come to her fevered brain since her attack. Nature was working her remedy in her own fas.h.i.+on.
Catherine stooped and looked intently at the quiet face. She saw that it was pinched and white and that a circle of dark purple surrounded the closed eyelids.
She also noticed how thin had become the arm on which the head was lying, the poor head off which all the beautiful hair had been shorn close.
But there was a happy smile on the half-parted lips of the sleeping girl, her dreams were sweet.