HARDLY WON.
Unfortunately, the Major Sahib, not knowing all the circumstances of
the case, did not look at things quite in the same light as Rahah, and
Georgia was not left long in doubt as to his view of the matter.
Betaking herself to the terrace outside her room at the hour when she
usually carried on her heliographic communications with Fitz, she was
surprised to find that the conversation was opened by a complicated
series of flashes in such rapid succession that she could not read
them off.
“It can’t be Mr Anstruther,” she said to herself; “he never begins in
that way. Can it be Dick who is doing it? It looks like some kind of
private signal--or it might be ‘Attention!’ flashed very fast. Oh,
here is the message!”
But the perplexity on her face only became deeper when she had written
down the words, for their tone was not of the pleasantest.
“Get your things ready at once. I am coming to fetch you.
Dick.”
Was the victory to be snatched away when it was so nearly within her
grasp? Georgia set her teeth hard as she flashed back--
“Cannot possibly leave to-night. Come for me in the morning.
Georgia.”
The answer arrived quickly.
“I am starting immediately, and shall expect to find you ready.”
This was a little too much. Georgia’s calmness, which had been
subjected to a considerable strain already by the excitements of the
day, gave way altogether, and it was with a hand that trembled a good
deal that she signalled back--
“I must beg of you not to come, as I decline to start to-night.” Then,
repenting of the tone of her message, she added, “I am longing to see
you, but it is absolutely impossible for me to come before to-morrow
morning.”
This time no answer was returned; but after a while, during which she
stood watching anxiously, and wondering whether Dick was actually on
his way to fetch her, she saw a solitary flash. This was the sign that
Fitz was beginning operations, and she signalled at once--
“What is Major North doing?”
“Gone to his quarters,” came the answer, “in a vile temper. Excuse me,
but this is true. Looks seedy, too; but he brought a surgeon with his
force, so don’t worry about him.”
“Please tell him from me----” began Georgia, but the flashes came
again--
“He won’t let me in. Stratford is calling me. I must go.”
Georgia left the heliograph with a sigh, for it was growing too late
to catch the sunlight properly, and she had a hard piece of work
before her this evening, the very crown and object, indeed, of her
visit to Bir-ul-Malikat. Returning to Zeynab’s room, she found Khadija
sitting crouched in her usual attitude upon the divan, and addressed
her--
“I have performed what I promised, Khadija. Zeynab’s foot is getting
on most satisfactorily, and needs only proper treatment and careful
dressing, so that it is quite safe for me to return to Bir-ul-Malik
to-morrow. I have shown the slave-girl, Bilkis, how to dress the
wound, and I will send her over a good supply of lint and bandages and
the other things I use, so that she may continue the treatment. She
can do the work as well as I can, if she has the right materials. Now
I am come to claim my reward. Give it to me, and let us go in peace.”
“What was it that I promised thee?” asked Khadija slowly, when Rahah
had translated her mistress’s words.
“The antidote for the poison which they call the Father of sleep, and
the directions for applying it,” said Georgia, promptly.
“Ah, the antidote!--it is well; I have it here,” and Khadija drew a
small square box from one corner of her ample veil, which was tied up
in a knot. “Take it, O doctor lady, and may it succeed in thy hands!”
“Is this all that is necessary?” asked Georgia, opening the box, and
finding in it only a small quantity of flaky white powder.
“I swear to thee that it is all thou canst need.”
“And how is it to be applied?”
“Nay; I made no promise to tell thee that.” Khadija’s sharp little
eyes gleamed cunningly.
“Very well, Khadija; then I shall remain here, and Yakub at
Bir-ul-Malik, and my friends there will send a message to Fath-ud-Din
at Kubbet-ul-Haj.”
“Nay; I was but joking, O doctor lady. Thou shalt do as I bid thee,”
and Georgia noted down the details of what sounded like a rude Turkish
bath, repeated three or four times, and varied by the administration
of copious draughts of a decoction made with the powder in the box.
“And you are sure that you have given me all that is necessary for
effecting a cure?” asked Georgia, suspiciously, for the powder
possessed no healing qualities that were perceptible either to sight,
smell, or taste.
“O doctor lady, I have given thee all. I swear it to thee by----” and
Khadija ran glibly through a catalogue of sacred persons and objects,
followed by an even more solemn list of divine names. Still Georgia
was not satisfied. She looked helplessly at Rahah, for she could not
hit upon any means of convicting Khadija of her falsehood, if
falsehood there was. But Rahah was equal to the occasion.
“I will make her tell the truth, O my lady. Lay thy hand on the head
of the child Zeynab, O Khadija, and swear as I shall bid thee.”
“O doctor lady! O my nurse! let it not be on my head!” expostulated
Zeynab in a terrified voice, as Khadija rose reluctantly from her seat
to comply with the imperious demand.
“Dear child, it can’t hurt you,” said Georgia. “It is merely a form.”
“Nay,” said Rahah, “rather is it that if any evil befalls thee, it is
through Khadija’s lies, and by her fault. Go to the other side of the
room, O my lady. Stoop down, O Khadija; lay thy hand here, and say
after me, ‘If I have told lies to the doctor lady, and have not given
her all that I promised, and if the Envoy cannot be cured by the
medicine she holds in her hand, then let a curse light upon this
child. May she wither away in her youth, and not live to see her
marriage night. May the disgrace of her father ever continue and
increase, and his name be blotted out without a son to bear it after
him. May the house that should have mated with princes fall and perish
in dishonour, and may all that remain of it live only to shame it.’”
“O my nurse, let not the curse light upon me!” sobbed Zeynab.
“Be quiet, O daughter of iniquity!” said Khadija angrily, and laying
her hand on the child’s head with a menacing pressure, she repeated
the words after Rahah. Zeynab made no further protest, but lay silent,
looking white and frightened, much to the alarm of Georgia. She
regretted deeply that she had allowed Rahah to make so solemn an
attempt to work upon the superstitious fears of the old woman, and
urged her to withdraw the curse, lest the thought of it should do
Zeynab harm, but Rahah refused stoutly.
“I cannot withdraw it, O my lady. Khadija has invoked it, and if she
was trying to deceive thee, she knew the danger that she was bringing
upon the child. If she has dealt with us honestly, all will yet be
well; but if evil befalls her master’s house, we shall know that it
was her own doing.”
“You are certainly not so well to-night, Zeynab,” said Georgia, laying
her hand on the child’s forehead as she prepared to leave her at
bedtime. “Is anything the matter? Surely you are not thinking of those
foolish words? I am very sorry that I let Rahah say them, but they
can’t do you any harm.”
The child made no answer, but looked up with a frightened face, and
Rahah translated Georgia’s first remark for the benefit of Khadija.
The old woman sprang up from the divan instantly, in a towering rage,
and after a hasty glance at Zeynab, turned upon Georgia and Rahah, and
drove them out of the room with a storm of curses, alleging that they
had bewitched the child in order to frighten her. When they reached
their own room, Georgia was inclined to be low-spirited over the issue
of her mission, but her maid displayed no signs of discouragement.
“Wait!” she said mysteriously, and they waited, taking the opportunity
of gathering their possessions together in view of the return to
Bir-ul-Malik the next day. They had been in their room about an hour,
when the jingling of anklets along the passage, and a hurried knock at
the door, announced a visitor. Rahah opened the door cautiously, and
Khadija entered and walked up to Georgia.
“Give me the medicine,” she said abruptly, and taking from her bosom a
small phial, half filled with a clear colourless liquid, she emptied
the powder into it from the box, shook up the resultant mixture, and
closing the phial, handed it back to Georgia.
“Take it, O doctor lady,” she said. “But for the curse, thou shouldst
never have had it. But truly God is great, and He is good to the
accursed English, so that the old spells and the magic of our fathers
cannot stand before theirs. And now come and take away the curse from
my Rose of the World, for I cannot see her fade and die before my
eyes.”
Followed by Rahah, Georgia returned to Zeynab’s room, where they found
the child tossing restlessly on her bed.
“O my nurse, take it away!” was her cry. “I feel the curse; I know it
has come upon me. I cannot sleep. There is a weight on my heart and a
fire in my bones, and it is thou that art killing me.”
“The curse is gone, my dove,” said Khadija. “I have given the rest of
the medicine to the doctor lady.”
“But how can I believe thee? I feel no better,” moaned Zeynab.
“O doctor lady, wilt thou still kill my child?” cried the old woman in
a frenzy. “I could give thee no more if she were dying at this moment.
Take away from her thy curse and thy evil enchantments.”
Sitting down beside the bed, Georgia took the hot little hands into
one of hers, and with the other smoothed back the tangled hair from
the child’s brow. It was more than an hour before all her stories and
her talk could banish the haunting horror from Zeynab’s mind, and
induce her to close her bright eyes, and her doctor was nearly worn
out when she was at last able to leave her. Sheer fatigue made Georgia
sleep soundly, in spite of the excitement of the past day, and she and
Rahah were not disturbed again that night. In the morning Fitz flashed
an inquiry as to the time at which she would like to be fetched from
Bir-ul-Malikat, and about eleven o’clock she saw the cavalcade she was
expecting enter the courtyard. There was a hurried collecting together
of packages, a hasty farewell to Zeynab, who wept copiously, and would
not be comforted even by the promise that she should receive every
picture-paper Georgia could lay her hands on, and then, accompanied by
Khadija, the visitors went down to the courtyard. To Georgia’s
surprise and disappointment, it was Stratford and Fitz who came
eagerly to meet her as she appeared at the door shrouded in her
_burka_.
“Where is Dick? He is not ill, is he?” she asked anxiously of
Stratford, remembering Fitz’s message of the night before.
“He is so busy that he was obliged to send his apologies, and allow us
the honour of escorting you instead of coming to fetch you himself,”
said Stratford, in tones which were absolutely devoid of any
suggestion of ulterior meaning.
“Oh!” said Georgia, blankly.
“He found himself compelled to hold a full-dress review of his
detachment, or inspect their kits, or do stables, or something
complicated and professional of that kind,” said Fitz, with a dogged
resentment aggressively conspicuous in his manner.
“Nonsense, Anstruther! You know as well as I do that he would have
allowed nothing but absolute necessity to keep him from coming,” said
Stratford.
“Oh yes, of course,” said Georgia, in the most natural tone she could
command. She would not let it be seen that she perceived the flimsy
character of the excuse, but she felt deeply mortified as she allowed
Stratford to mount her on her horse, and she resented his evident
determination to smooth things over almost more than Fitz’s
undisguised incredulity. “How _horrid_ of Dick!” was what she said to
herself as she gathered up the reins, and the hot tears rose to her
eyes under the shadow of the _burka_.
“Stay, Englishman!” cried Khadija from the doorstep, when Stratford,
having seen Rahah and the luggage safely bestowed, was about to mount
his own horse. “Where is Yakub, my son, whom I left at Bir-ul-Malik as
a pledge for the safe return of the doctor lady?”
“I hope that Yakub will come back to you safe and sound in a few
days,” returned Stratford in Ethiopian, speaking so carefully that it
was evident he had studied his sentences with Kustendjian before
starting. “For the present, however, I think it well to detain him, on
my own responsibility. We don’t want any mistakes made about that
medicine for the Envoy. As soon as he has recovered, you shall have
your son back.”
For answer, Khadija threw herself upon the ground, wailing and tearing
her hair and beating her breast, and calling upon Heaven and upon
Georgia to witness that she had performed all that was required of
her, and that she had given her all the necessary ingredients for the
medicine. Georgia, remembering the scene in Zeynab’s room the night
before, and indignant at being compelled to bear a part in what was
not far removed from a breach of faith, espoused her cause, and joined
her in demanding that Yakub should be at once released. In spite,
however, of all that she could say, Stratford remained immovable, and
mounting his horse, ordered an immediate start. But before the horses
had gone more than a few steps, Khadija rose from the ground, and
forcing her way through the escort, caught hold of Georgia’s rein.
“O doctor lady,” she cried, with such reluctance that she seemed
almost to be torn in two by the conflicting passions in her mind, “I
had forgotten one thing. After the first administration of the
medicine, the sick man will sleep for two days and two nights a
natural sleep. If he is awakened in that time he will die, but if he
awakes of himself, all will be well. And now”--her tone changed
suddenly--“now go thy way, O thrice accursed daughter of an accursed
father, and when first thy bridegroom looks upon thy face on thy
wedding-night, may he turn his back on thee and say, ‘O woman, I
divorce thee!’ and so thrust thee out.”
“Come, that’s enough,” said Stratford peremptorily, loosening her hand
from the rein. “You know now that it depends on yourself whether your
son returns to you in safety or not. Has Anstruther told you, Miss
Keeling, that we had a messenger from Jahan Beg the day before
yesterday?”
“No, I had not heard of it,” returned Georgia, following his example
in ignoring the baffled Khadija, who stood shaking her fist and
shrieking curses after the party. “What news did he bring?”
“The best news possible. Jahan Beg has succeeded in unearthing the
conspirators who were troubling him when we left the city, and has
made it impossible for them, at any rate, to do more plotting. Among
other things, he discovered that they meant to stop us and keep us
here in order to get hold of the treaty, and therefore he sent
stringent orders to Abd-ur-Rahim to let us go at once with all our
property, on pain of death. Messengers were also sent to all the towns
and forts on the road and along the frontier, ordering the governors
on no account to oppose the advance of any English relieving force
coming from Khemistan, but to afford it every assistance, as if they
didn’t Fath-ud-Din would suffer. That accounts for North’s getting
back to us so quickly.”
“How far had he to go?” asked Georgia.
“Only as far as Rahmat-Ullah, for Hicks had got there before him, and
frightened the Government about us a good deal, so that they had
already ordered up a couple of troops of the Khemistan Horse, in
addition to those usually stationed at the fort, and as soon as they
arrived he started back with them. Of course such a small force would
have been no use if the country had been up, but it was intended
merely as an armed escort, just to make a dash for Bir-ul-Malik and
back to Rahmat-Ullah.”
“Then they must have travelled very fast,” said Georgia, her mind
reverting to her glimpse of Dick the day before.
“Yes, they made forced marches all the way. North kept them at it, but
he looks awfully done up now,” said the wily Stratford.
“It would have done him good to ride out here,” said Georgia, refusing
to commit herself.
“Yes; but you know how conscientious he is. So long as there is
anything to be done, he will simply work till he drops.”
“Oh dear, I do hope he isn’t going to be ill!” sighed Georgia, and
Stratford judged that his scheme had succeeded. He guessed rightly,
for all the resentment in Georgia’s mind was swallowed up in anxiety,
and she could not spare a thought for her own insulted dignity when
Dick was suffering, perhaps had even endangered his life, through his
eagerness to rescue her. She said little during the remainder of the
ride, and could scarcely devote a moment even to glancing at the camp
of the Khemistan Horse, which was pitched beside the hill of
Bir-ul-Malik. Arrived at the palace, she bestowed a hasty greeting on
Kustendjian and Ismail Bakhsh, and hurried into the harem in search of
Lady Haigh, who rushed to meet her, and in the intervals of kissing
and crying over her, scolded her soundly for her persistence in
remaining away.
“But I have got the antidote!” cried Georgia, exhibiting the little
bottle proudly; “and remember, Lady Haigh, you promised that I should
use it.”
“How could I prevent your trying it, my dear child, when you risked
your life in obtaining it? But it was not even your danger that I was
thinking about so much at the moment. It was Major North, and his view
of the case.”
“Oh, Dick and I must settle our little differences together,” said
Georgia, as lightly as she could. “Where is he? I haven’t seen him
yet.”
“I think I hear his step outside,” said Lady Haigh. “He must have
followed you into the house. But, Georgia, I must warn you, he looks
very seedy, and I think he is just a little bit cross. Don’t be harder
on him than you can help, dear, for he has been through a fearfully
anxious time. He has had very little sleep since he left here, and has
been at work day and night, almost without a rest.”
If Lady Haigh considered it advisable to offer her this warning,
Georgia judged that Dick’s fit of ill-temper must be of an extremely
pronounced character; but her conscience was clear, although her heart
beat a little faster than usual as she left Lady Haigh in the inner
room and went out into the larger one. Dick was leaning against the
framework of the lattice, and raised himself slowly to greet her.
“Oh, Dick, how ill you look!” she cried. “My dear boy, you ought to be
in bed.”
As soon as the words had passed her lips, she was struck by their
singularly malapropos character under the circumstances, and Dick
frowned heavily.
“Well, Georgia?” was all he said.
“Why, Dick, have you nothing more to say to me than that? Do you know
that you haven’t seen me for over a week?”
“I was under the impression that you might have seen me yesterday
evening, and preferred not to do so.”
“But I couldn’t help that. It was not a matter of choice. One can’t
leave a patient before his cure is fairly complete.”
“You prefer your patient to me, then?”
“To see you would have been a pleasure; to stay there was a duty.”
“Even when I had desired you to come back at once?”
“That couldn’t alter my duty.”
“Indeed?” Dick lifted his eyebrows. “Then my wishes have no weight
with you whatever?”
“They have great weight with me, but mine ought to have just as much
with you.”
“This is rather a new theory,” said Dick, with elaborate politeness.
“Is its application intended to be permanent, or only temporary?”
“I see no reason to anticipate any change that would render it out of
date.”
“Thank you. That’s pretty clear, at any rate. Perhaps you will kindly
explain to me your views of the marriage relation? So far as I can
see, they involve two heads of one house.”
“I don’t want to discuss the question now, especially since we used to
argue it so often in the old days,” said Georgia; “but if you insist
upon it, I will. I know very well that there can be only one head,
practically speaking, to a household--that when two people ride one
horse, one must ride behind--and because I love you and trust you, I
am quite willing to take the second place. But I do expect to be
consulted as to the way the horse is to go. You could never have
imagined that I would allow myself to be carried off anywhere
blindfold. I think that we should discuss everything together and
agree upon our course, and if at any time circumstances should prevent
our discussing some special plan, I expect you to trust me if I find
it necessary to act on my own responsibility, just as I should be
ready to trust you in a like case.”
“This is the New Woman’s idea of marriage!” sneered Dick.
“It is my view of it, at any rate. Did you expect to find in me a
slave without any will of her own, Dick? I am not a young girl, but a
woman, who has led a sufficiently lonely and independent life, and you
knew that when you asked me to marry you.”
“Yes, and I was a fool to do it,” said Dick, roughly.
Georgia turned away, deeply wounded, and he stood at the lattice,
looking out over the desert with gloomy eyes. She did not know that
more had happened to try his temper than even the hardships and
anxiety of which Lady Haigh had spoken. An ill-advised comrade, who
had heard of his engagement through Mr Hicks, had seen fit to chaff
him that morning on the eagerness with which he had pressed forward to
rescue a lady who neither wanted his help nor desired his presence,
and the words had rankled in his mind. But although Georgia was
ignorant of this fact, she could not consent to leave things in their
present state. To take offence at his hasty speech, and break off her
engagement there and then, would be a course of conduct worthy only of
a mythical lady who always acted the part of an awful warning for
Georgia and her friends, and whom they were in the habit of calling
“The Early Victorian Female.” It is, perhaps, needless to add that
this person was given to gushing over indifferent poetry, fainted with
great regularity at the most inconvenient moments, and when she had a
misunderstanding with her lover, accepted the fact meekly, and pined
away and died. Georgia felt it morally impossible to imitate her. To
what purpose had been her own education and her experience of life if
they did not enable her to stoop to conquer, and to hold her own
without being aggressive? Was all that had passed between herself and
Dick to be blotted out by a few words spoken in a moment of
irritation? She crossed the room to his side and put her hands on his
shoulders.
[image: images/img_12.jpg
caption:
She crossed the room to his side and put her hands on his shoulders.]
“Look at me, Dick,” she said. But Dick would not turn round.
“You goad a man into saying beastly things to you,” he muttered, “and
then you try and get round him when he is feeling ashamed of himself.”
Such an unpromising reception of her effort to make peace might well
have daunted Georgia, but she could forgive much to Dick, simply
because he was Dick. She turned his moody face towards hers and made
him look at her.
“Don’t think of it any more, Dick,” she said. “My dear boy, do you
imagine I don’t care for you enough to forgive you that? And let us
leave the question of our married life to right itself. If it hadn’t
been for this, we should have glided into it naturally, and things
would have settled themselves. Surely two people who are neither of
them by nature quarrelsome, and who are anxious to do right, ought to
be able to get on together, if both are willing to give and take? I
can trust you, Dick; won’t you trust me?”
It added considerably to the discomfort of Dick’s present state of
mind that he was conscious that Georgia was behaving with a
magnanimity to which he could lay no claim, but he had started with
the determination to put his foot down, and to show Georgia before
they were married that he would stand no nonsense, and he stuck to his
point doggedly. “I don’t intend to be made to look a fool before all
the world,” he growled.
“But who would want to make you look a fool? You must know that your
honour is as dear to me as to yourself. Haven’t I shown that I won’t
keep you back when duty calls you? Can’t you trust me, Dick? If you
can’t, things had better be over between us, indeed. Suppose you were
out, and I was summoned to a dangerous case, and couldn’t possibly let
you know. It would be my duty to go, just as it would be yours to
start if you were ordered somewhere on special service, and couldn’t
even say good-bye to me. Can’t we act on this understanding?”
“But how can you be sure that you can trust me, may I ask? Many men
make rash promises before marriage, and break them like a shot
afterwards. How do you know that I am not one of them?”
“Oh, not you, Dick! You are a gentleman; I can trust you fully. Tell
me that you will agree, and let us forget all this worry.”
“You are trying to get round me,” said Dick again, helplessly. “I
can’t think what I was going to say; everything seems to have gone out
of my head. What is the matter?” looking irritably at her frightened
face. “There’s nothing wrong with me. I think--things had better
be--over between us, Georgie. We should never--agree. What was I
saying last? What’s the matter with the walls? Is it--an earthquake?”
He was reeling as he stood, and clutching wildly at the frame of the
lattice for support. Georgia caught him by the arm, for he had missed
his hold and was swaying backwards and forwards, and succeeded in
guiding him to the divan.
“I feel--awfully queer,” he said, and fainted away before Georgia
could seek a restorative. She cried out, and Lady Haigh and Rahah came
rushing in, the latter followed by Dick’s bearer, whose countenance
declared plainly that he considered his master’s illness to be
entirely due to Georgia, and that it was just what he had expected.
With the help of some of the other servants, Dick was carried to his
own room, where for several days he was to lie moaning and tossing
under a bad attack of fever. Georgia had her hands full during this
period, even though the bearer declined respectfully to allow her any
share in the actual nursing, for besides her care for Dick, she was
engaged in testing, with scarcely less anxiety, the effect upon Sir
Dugald’s health of the antidote she had obtained with so much
difficulty. She would have preferred to choose a time when she could
give her whole attention to his case, but he had appeared so much
weaker of late that Lady Haigh was feverishly eager for the remedy to
be tried at once, and in fear and trembling Georgia put into practice
the directions she had received from Khadija. Her courage revived to a
certain extent when she found that the resulting symptoms corresponded
exactly with those described by the old woman, but the two days of
heavy slumber proved to be a period of intense anxiety. Every sound
was hushed in the neighbourhood of Sir Dugald’s sick-room, and the
watchers scarcely dared to move or breathe. At last, just as Georgia
had returned to her other patient after a heart-breaking visit to
Dick, who was calling on her constantly, although he refused to
recognise her when she stood beside him, there was a sudden movement
on the part of Sir Dugald, and Lady Haigh grasped her arm
convulsively.
“Go to him, and let him see you first when he wakes,” said Georgia, in
a low whisper, and Lady Haigh obeyed.
“Well, Elma!” It was Sir Dugald’s voice, very weak, but without a hint
of delirium. “Haven’t you got the place rather dark?”
Georgia threw the lattice partly open, and he looked round.
“Still at Kubbet-ul-Haj, I see.” They had purposely arranged the bed
and the camp-furniture in the same positions that they had occupied in
his room at the Mission, with the object of avoiding a sudden shock.
“I should have said we must have left it long ago, but I have had the
most extraordinary dreams. Could it have been a touch of fever, do you
think? But is that Miss Keeling? Ah, this explains it. I must have
been ill?”
“Yes, you have frightened us all very much, Sir Dugald,” said Georgia,
for Lady Haigh was incapable of speech.
“Ah, it was a bad attack, then, was it? Queer that I don’t remember
feeling it coming on. The treaty is not signed yet, I suppose?”
“Yes, it is signed. You have been ill for some time--longer than you
think.”
“I always knew that Stratford was a clever fellow. This is the best
news you could have brought me, Miss Keeling. But we ought to be
thinking of returning to Khemistan if we have secured the treaty. How
long do you give me to get well enough to mount a horse again?”
“You mustn’t be in too great a hurry. We might carry you in a litter.”
“No, thank you. It would be too much like my dreams. I have suffered
agonies through imagining that I was in a trance, and about to be
buried alive, because they thought I was dead. It seemed to me that I
could see people moving about all round me, but I could not move, or
speak, or feel. Then I was put in a coffin, and carried off to be
buried. It always ended there, but it came over and over again. It was
the horrible helplessness--my absolute powerlessness to make any sign
to show that I was alive--which was the worst thing about it.”
“Oh, Dugald!” cried Lady Haigh, in a strangled voice--and kissing him
hastily, she hurried out of the room.
“Lady Haigh has been very much frightened about you, Sir Dugald,” said
Georgia. “She has watched over you night and day, and I have often
wondered that she did not break down.”
“Please look after her,” he said, anxiously. “She has wonderful pluck,
but sometimes she is obliged to give way altogether, and I’m afraid
from what you say that she must be quite overdone.”
Georgia left the room, and found Lady Haigh sobbing on the divan
outside, with her face buried in a cushion that Sir Dugald might not
hear her. Sitting down beside her, Georgia began to cry too, out of
pure sympathy, until Lady Haigh suddenly choked back her sobs, and
throwing her arms round her, cried--
“Oh, Georgie, Georgie, you have given me back my husband, and it has
cost you Major North!”
“You mustn’t think of that. There ought to be a change in Dick’s state
before long.”
“Georgie, I will nurse him night and day--every moment that I can
spare from Sir Dugald, that is. And if I can’t put things right
between you when he is better, I’ll--I’ll----”
“But what if he doesn’t want things put right?” asked Georgia, sadly.
* * * * * *
When Dick recovered consciousness, after a very long and fatiguing
dream, in which many people and events had played more or less
inappropriate parts, he found himself in bed with a cold bandage on
his forehead, and a feeling all over him that he had lost more
strength than he had ever possessed. There was some one in the room,
and he gathered that it was Lady Haigh. She was speaking to some one
else at the door.
“I will leave him to you, then, Georgie. He is beautifully asleep
still, and I have just changed the bandage.”
The door closed softly, and Dick was aware that Lady Haigh had gone
out and that the other person had come in, and was sitting just out of
his sight as he lay in bed. That was not what he wanted, and he tried
painfully to turn his head in her direction. She was at his side in a
moment.
“Are you tired of lying in that position?” she asked. “Shall I help
you to turn over?”
“Not if you will sit where I can see you,” he answered, and his voice
sounded to himself weak and far-away. Georgia changed her place as he
wished, but she took up the book she had been reading and went on with
it.
“Why won’t you speak to me, Georgie?” he asked, querulously.
“Because you are forbidden to talk until you are a little stronger.”
“I don’t care! Put down that book and sit nearer me.”
“No,” said Georgia, with decision. “You are not to excite yourself
with talking. Lie still, and try to go to sleep.”
“Why do you talk to me like that? I haven’t done anything to make you
angry with me, have I? Why are you so unkind?”
“I don’t want to be unkind,” returned Georgia, hastily; “but you
really ought not to talk. I will answer any number of questions when
you are better.”
“But why won’t you call me Dick? We didn’t quarrel, did we? I have a
sort of idea---- But my head was awfully queer, and I daresay I talked
a lot of rot. I can’t apologise properly until I remember more about
it. But if we quarrelled, why are you here looking after me like
this?”
“Simply and solely as your medical adviser.” There was the slightest
possible suspicion of triumph in Georgia’s tone, the reason for which
Dick did not perceive until afterwards. She returned to her book, and
he lay and looked at her in a puzzled kind of way.
“I wish you would take my temperature,” he said at last.
“What, are you feverish again?” she asked anxiously, getting out her
thermometer as she rose and came towards him.
“I don’t know; but I remember you were doing it once when I was just
about half awake, and I liked it. You put your arm under my head.”
“If you will talk so much, I shall call Lady Haigh.”
“But do take my temperature! I thought sick people always had
everything they wanted.”
“Everything in reason. Patients are expected not to trouble their
doctors unnecessarily. Now try to go to sleep.” And Georgia returned
the thermometer resolutely to its case.
“Would it be considered a thing in reason if a patient asked his
doctor to give him a kiss? What would the doctor say?”
“That anything of the kind would be highly unprofessional.”
“Well, this patient,” said Dick, weakly, “refuses to try to go to
sleep unless his doctor acts in that unprofessional way.”
And his doctor did.