“Well, what if you did?” she demanded. “I can’t be in two places at once, and these people won’t eat you up. Make up your mind that you won’t faint, and then you probably won’t.”
Barth peered up at her uneasily.
“Are you—are you a Christian Scientist?” he asked.
Nancy’s laugh rang out gayly.
“Didn’t I say my father was a doctor?” she reminded him. “Now please do lie still and save your strength, and I’ll see what I can do about it all.”
She was gone from his side only for a moment. Then she came flying back, flushed and eager.
“Such luck!” she said. “Right at the foot of the hill, I found Père Gagnier and the cabbage cart, just coming home from market. He will be here in a minute, and he talks French. Some of these people will carry you to the cart, and you can be driven right up to the door. That will take so much less time than the sending for my father; and, besides, even if he came down, you couldn’t be left lying here on the gravel walk for an indefinite period. You would be arrested for blocking the path of the pilgrims, to say nothing of having relays of cripples crutching themselves along over you.”
In her relief at having solved the situation, she paid no heed to the stream of nonsense coming from her lips. Barth’s stare recalled her to self-consciousness.
“No, really,” he answered stiffly.
“Well, daddy?”