Part 10 (2/2)
”Sarah Anne will not allow it to be open,” said Lady Sarah. ”She is sensitive to cold, dear child, and feels the slightest draught.”
Mr. Snow walked to the chimney, turned up his coat cuff and wristband, and pulled down a bag filled with shavings. Soot came with it, and covered his hand; but he did not mind that. He was as little given to ceremony as Lady Sarah to caution, and he went leisurely up to the wash-hand-stand to remove it.
”Now, if I catch that bag, or any other bag up there again, obstructing the air, I shall attack the bricks next time, and make a good big hole that the sky can be seen through. Of that I give you notice, my lady.”
He next pulled down the window at the top, behind the blind; but the room, at its best, did not find favour with him. ”It is not airy; it is not cool,” he said. ”Is there not a better ventilated room in the house?
If so, she should be moved into it.”
”My room is cool,” interposed Ethel eagerly. ”The sun never s.h.i.+nes into it, Mr. Snow.”
It would appear that Ethel's thus speaking must have reminded Mr. Snow that she was present. In the unceremonious manner that he had laid hands upon the chimney bag, he now laid them upon her shoulders, and marshalled her outside the door.
”You go downstairs, Miss Ethel. And do not come within a mile of this chamber again, until I give you leave to do so.”
”I will not be moved into Ethel's room!” interposed Sarah Anne, imperiously and fretfully. ”It is not furnished with half the comforts of mine. And it has only a bit of bedside carpet! I will not go there, Mr. Snow.”
”Now look you here, Miss Sarah Anne!” said the surgeon firmly. ”I am responsible for bringing you well out of this illness; and I shall take my own way to do it. If not; if I am to be contradicted at every suggestion; Lady Sarah may summon some one else to attend you: I will not undertake it.”
”My darling, you shall not be moved to Ethel's room,” cried my lady coaxingly: ”you shall be moved into mine. It is larger than this, you know, Mr. Snow, with a thorough draught through it, if you choose to put the windows and door open.”
”Very well,” said Mr. Snow. ”Let me find her in it when I come up again this evening. And if there's a carpet on the floor, take it up. Carpets were never intended for bedrooms.”
He pa.s.sed into one of the sitting-rooms with Lady Sarah when he descended. ”What do you think of the case?” she eagerly asked.
”There will be some difficulty with it,” was the candid reply. ”Lady Sarah, her hair must come off.”
”Her hair come off!” uttered Lady Sarah, aghast. ”That it never shall!
She has the loveliest hair! What is Ethel's hair, compared with hers?”
”You heard the determination I expressed, Lady Sarah,” he quietly said.
”But Sarah Anne will never allow it to be done,” she returned, s.h.i.+fting the ground of remonstrance from her own shoulders. ”And to do it in opposition to her would be enough to kill her.”
”It will not be done in opposition to her,” he answered. ”She will be unconscious before it is attempted.”
Lady Sarah's heart sank. ”You antic.i.p.ate that she will be dangerously ill?”
”In these cases there is always danger, Lady Sarah. But worse cases than--- as I believe--hers will be, have recovered from it.”
”If I lose her, I shall die myself!” she pa.s.sionately uttered. ”And, if she is to have it badly, she will die! Remember, Mr. Snow, how weak she has always been!”
”We sometimes find that weak const.i.tutions battle best with an epidemic,” he replied. ”Many a sound one has it struck down and taken off; many a sickly one has struggled through it, and been the stronger for it afterwards.”
”Everything shall be done as you wish,” said Lady Sarah, speaking meekly in her great fear.
”Very well. There is one caution I would earnestly impress upon you: that of keeping Ethel from the sick-room.”
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