And they left the room on tiptoe, closing the door behind them very softly. Upon Devonham's face lay a curious expression, half anxiety, half pain.
[CHAPTER XXI]
DR. FILLERY, lying on a couch in his patient's bedroom, snatched some four to five hours' sleep, though, if "snatched," it was certainly enjoyed—a deep, dreamless, reposeful slumber. He woke, refreshed in mind and body, and the first thing he saw, even before he had time to stretch a limb or move his head, was two great blue eyes gazing into his own across the room. They belonged, it first struck him, to some strange being that had followed him out of sleep—he had not yet recovered full consciousness and the effects of sleep still hovered; then an earlier phrase recurred: to some divine great animal.
"N. H.," in his bed in the opposite corner, lay gazing at him. He returned the gaze. Into the blue eyes came at once a look of happy recognition, of contentment, almost a smile. Then they closed again in sleep.
The room was full of morning sunshine. Fillery rose quietly, and performed his toilet in his own quarters, but on returning after a hurried breakfast, the patient still slept soundly. He slept on for hours, he slept the morning through; but for the obvious evidences of perfect normal health, it might have been a state of coma. The body did not even change its position once.
He left Devonham in charge, and was on his way to visit some of the other cases, when Nurse Robbins stood before him. Miss Khilkoff had "called to inquire after Mr. LeVallon," and was waiting downstairs in case Dr. Fillery could also see her.
He glanced at her pretty slim figure and delicate complexion, her hair, fine, plentiful and shiny, her dark eyes with a twinkle in them. She was an attractive, intelligent, experienced, young woman, tactful too, and of great use with extra sensitive patients. She was, of course, already hopelessly in love with her present "case." His "singing," so she called it to Mrs. Soames, had excited her "like a glass of wine—some music makes you feel like that—so that you could love everybody in the world." She already called him Master.
"Please say I will be down at once," said Dr. Fillery, watching her for the first time with interest as he remembered these details Paul had told him. The girl, it now struck him, was intensely alive. There was a gain, an increase, in her appearance somewhere. He recalled also the matron's remark—she was not usually loquacious with her nurses—that "he's no ordinary case, and I've seen a good few, haven't I? The way he understands animals and flowers alone proves that!"
Dr. Fillery went downstairs.