"Minnie! What's the matter with Minnie?" cried Lesbia, suddenly interested. "Is she ill? What is it?"
Kitty was reading the letter half aloud and half to herself, in that particularly aggravating fashion which gives a few leading words and skips the important points.
"Certainly—um—um—to go—um—um—um—complete rest—um—never be well——"
"I wish you'd tell me what's the matter?" urged Lesbia, dancing with impatience.
Kitty finished the first sheet and handed it on to her. The Canadian friend, Mrs. Johnson, had paid a visit to the Hiltons and sent grave accounts of Minnie's health.
"Mrs. Hilton certainly ought to go away to a nursing home for several months' complete rest," so the letter ran, "she'll never be well until she does. She says, however, it's out of the question, she can't leave her husband and the children to the tender mercies of a mulatto 'help' and a Chinese 'boy', both of whom may elect to leave at any moment without notice, if the whim seizes them. You know what servants are out here. It seems a pity she has no relations who could come and take charge for a while, and give her the chance of getting well. She really looks hardly fit to be going about. She tells me her husband advertised for a housekeeper, but such queer creatures turned up to offer themselves for the post it was impossible to engage one. These are some of the trials of our life out here."
Lesbia handed the letter back to Mrs. Patterson without a word. She could not trust herself to speak. She ran upstairs to her bedroom so that she might be alone. A wild struggle was going on in her heart. Minnie ill, and no one to help her! How much she owed to Paul and Minnie! Debts so great as that ought surely to be repaid. There were better things in the world even than cultivating your own talents, kind, unselfish things that counted far more in the long run. Lesbia was quick at making decisions. As eighteen months ago she had burnt her boats and run away from the Roumania on the spur of a moment, so now she equally impulsively changed her plans. She ran downstairs all excitement to announce her intentions.
"If Minnie's ill and needs me, I must go to her! Paris can wait. Six months in Canada won't spoil my career. I'll start the painting when I come back. Minnie will trust me to look after Paul and the children, when she wouldn't leave them with anybody else. I shall just make her pack off to a nursing home."
"I believe you're right," said Mrs. Patterson slowly. "In the circumstances you're about the only person who can persuade her. Yes, Lesbia, I think you ought to go."
So it was all arranged, a letter was sent off to the Hiltons, they cabled back "Come!", and Lesbia's passage was booked for the end of July. The matter seemed almost as big a hurry as her exodus of a year and a half ago, but with the vast difference that this time she went of her own free will, and, moreover, was an infinitely stronger and more helpful personality than the old dreamy Lesbia had been.