"Oh yes, yes, too hard," cried I. "They have met. I managed it once. But now I want them to meet again."
"That's why you were so anxious that Frank should come down for the elections," he said. "I wondered why you were so anxious."
"Yes, that's why. Don't you see?" I explained. "And now that he has had this accident it's worse than ever. You say it isn't very bad, and I'm glad; but don't you see how bad it must be for Joyce? It can't be good for her, can it? And so I want you to get him down here so that they can meet sometimes. You easily could. It would only be kind of you. He ought to be nursed up and made well again."
He dropped his eyes from my face, where they had been fastened, and got up and walked away towards the window.
"There is no one to do any nursing here," he said. "Frank can go to his mother to be nursed."
"Oh, well, I didn't mean nursing," I hastened to say, correcting myself. "I don't suppose he needs nursing, if it's no worse than you say."
There was a silence.
"You will ask him to come, won't you?" repeated I, softly.
The squire turned round. His face was quite hard.
"No, Miss Margaret," he said. "I can't do it. I would do anything to please you, but I can't do that. What you have told me distresses me very much—far more than you can guess. I had feared something of the sort in the spring; but then Frank went away, your sister and he were separated, and when she came back from her holidays, well—especially of late—I made sure that there had been nothing at all in it."