Overton looked up quickly. “Oh, your uncle was taken ill last night, was he? At what hour?”
“About one, I think. I went and called Bob and asked him to go for the doctor—I was very much alarmed at my uncle’s condition—and in the most surprisingly short time Bob had dressed and gone out and come back again. It was like a conjuror’s trick. And he has been so kind throughout this dreadful night; and yet—” She paused, and gave a little sigh.
“Where is Bob at this moment?” said Overton.
“Oh, with his father. Uncle Robert will not let him leave him for an instant.”
Overton did not answer. He felt unreasonably annoyed with Nellie for her attitude toward Vickers. The younger man’s avowal of love rang in his ears. She ought to be able to tell a man when she saw one, he thought.
He stood up. “Well, I suppose I can’t see him, then.”
His tone did not please Nellie, nor the ease with which he dismissed her warning.
“But I have not finished what I wanted to say,” she returned.
“Forgive me. You wished to warn me still further against the contaminating influence of your cousin?”
“I wanted to do nothing so futile,” said Nellie, with spirit. “I had not come to the point yet. It was of Louisa that I was thinking.”