“Joan may I come in?” asked Nessie’s voice at the door, and Joan rose at once, going to meet her.
“Mother didn’t like me to disturb you; but she thought I ought. Father seems so surprised not to see you. We think it worries him. Are you more rested, Joan?”
“Yes, quite,” Joan answered. “I’ll go to father directly. Do I look as if I had been crying, Nessie?”
Nessie made a sound of assent. “But the blinds are half down in the study,” she said; “so father may not see.”
Joan had not much hope. Altered as George Rutherford might be in many respects, he was keenly observant still, and no change of expression in the faces of those he loved ever passed unnoticed by him. Joan had not been five minutes in the study before he was asking—
“What is the matter, my dear?”
Dulcibel, just in the act of quitting the room, turned back to say—
“She went too far, George, and tired herself. It was a great pity. But she looks better now.”
“Was that the case?” asked George, as Dulcibel vanished. “Nothing but that?”
“I was tired, father.”