"I think he might have written us he was coming," she said with a sort of resentment. "Why do people want to take you by surprise?"
"At any rate," remarked Miss Clifford pleasantly, "it can't possibly make any difference. To me it seemed like an answer to prayer! It's just as though something had warned him his father was ill."
"How could anything possibly warn him of such a thing?" demanded the other with a touch of irritation. "A thing no one could have foreseen!"
"I don't know how, but I certainly felt a premonition of it, as I was telling the nurse a moment ago. If I had been away I am sure I should have come home at once, feeling as I did."
Lady Clifford carefully fitted another cigarette into her holder and lit it.
"I think the doctor is right, that we are all making far too much fuss over Charles's illness," she said abruptly. "After all, there has been nothing so far to cause us any alarm."
"Yes, you are quite right," agreed Miss Clifford simply. "And I am glad to hear you say so, my dear. You know you have really been more nervous than I have."
"Ah, that is the way I take things. I cannot help my nature!" sighed the Frenchwoman amicably enough. "I always fear the worst. I suppose now we had better ask the doctor if we can tell Charles about Roger's coming?"
"Is the doctor with him?"
"I will see."