"My dear, that is bad! I'd almost forgotten it, but it isn't healing at all, it looks quite inflamed."
"It's a beastly nuisance, it keeps catching in things and tearing open again. I haven't had a bandage on it since——" He left the sentence unfinished, for it had brought up memories of Esther. "Oh, well, it's nothing serious. Still, I had better let Sartorius attend to it, I suppose—sterilise it and so forth. Don't you think? He was after me this morning about the risk I was running of getting it infected, but I wouldn't wait."
He was pleased to have thought of this; he felt it made a sort of amends to Thérèse for the blow he had dealt her—if it was a blow. He was glad to see that she looked slightly gratified, it mitigated his guilty feeling.
"It is just as well to look after that sort of thing," Miss Clifford remarked placidly. "I can't help recalling poor Smithers, one of your father's foremen, who got a scratch from a bit of wire on one of the looms and died two weeks later of blood-poisoning."
As she spoke the door to the hall opened and the doctor came in, greeting the three with his usual phlegmatic calm. His presence put an immediate pall on the conversation which Miss Clifford made an effort to lift.
"Any news?" she inquired. "I suppose you have had no word from our
Miss Rowe?"
He turned a speculative eye upon her, pausing a moment as if trying to recall who Miss Rowe could be.
"Miss Rowe!" he repeated vaguely, moving towards the fire. "No, I have heard nothing. But then I have no reason to believe she will take the trouble to communicate with me."
The slight emphasis on the final word annoyed Roger, who glanced at the doctor keenly, wondering what was in the man's methodical, unemotional mind. Was he keeping something back? Did he know more of Esther than he was willing to say? It had not occurred to him until now.
Thérèse made a sudden graceful and impulsive movement.