“Ah! it is you, at last; I was sure you would come.”
Perhaps she thought me cold, “professional,” as if she had looked for a friend, and found only the doctor. Perhaps,--nay, it must be so, she never thought of me at all, except as “the doctor.”
“Upstairs; we carried him at once to his room. Will you come?”
So I followed--I seemed to have nothing to do but to follow that light figure, with the voice so low, the manner so quiet,--quieter than I ever expected to see hers, or any woman's, under such an emergency. I? what did I ever know of women? What did I deserve to know, except that a woman bore me? It is an odd fancy, but I have never thought so much about my mother as within the last few months. And sometimes, turning over the sole relics I have of hers, a ribbon or two, and a curl of hair, and calling to mind the few things Dallas remembered about her, I have imagined my mother, in her youth, must have been something like this young girl.
“You may come in now. You will not startle him; I think he knows nobody.”
I sat down beside my patient. He lay, just as he had been brought in from the road, with a blanket and counterpane thrown over him, breathing heavily, but quite unconscious.
“The light, please. Can you hold it for me? Is your hand steady?” And I held it a moment to judge. That weakness cost me too much; I took care not to risk it again.
When I finished my examination, and looked up, Miss Theodora was still standing by me. Her eyes only asked the question--which, thank God, I could answer as I did.
“Yes--it is a more hopeful case than I expected.”
At this shadow of hope--for it was only a shadow--the deadly quiet in which she had kept herself was stirred. She began to tremble exceedingly. I took the candle from her, and gave her a chair.
“Never mind me. It is only for a minute,” she said. One or two deep, hard sighs came, and then she recovered herself. “Now, what is to be done?”
I told her I would do all that was necessary, if she would bring me various things I mentioned.
“Can I help you? There is no one else. Penelope has hurt her foot, and cannot move, and the servants are mere girls. Shall I stay? If there is to be an operation, I am not afraid.”
For I had, unguardedly, taken out of my pocket the case of instruments which, after all, would not be needed. I told her so, adding that I had rather she left me alone with my patient.