She sank her head back in the cushions, and for a moment closed her eyes, half in weariness, half in tacit obedience to him. “Oh, I have such horrible dreams,” she said at length, “full of anxiety and fear for Morton and little Morton. I can’t explain it. But they are so horrible.”
Kennedy said nothing. She was talking freely at last.
“Only last night,” she went on, “I dreamt that Morton was dead. I could see the funeral, all the preparations, and the procession. It seemed that in the crowd there was a woman. I could not see her face, but she had fallen down and the crowd was around her. Then Dr. Maudsley appeared. Then all of a sudden the dream changed. I thought I was on the sand, at the seashore, or perhaps a lake. I was with Junior and it seemed as if he were wading in the water, his head bobbing up and down in the waves. It was like a desert, too—the sand. I turned, and there was a lion behind me. I did not seem to be afraid of him, although I was so close that I could almost feel his shaggy mane. Yet I feared that he might bite Junior. The next I knew I was running with the child in my arms. I escaped—and—oh, the relief!”
She sank back, half exhausted, half terrified still by the recollection.
“In your dream when Dr. Maudsley appeared,” asked Kennedy, evidently interested in filling in the gap, “what did he do?”
“Do?” she repeated. “In the dream? Nothing.”
“Are you sure?” he asked, shooting a quick glance at her.
“Yes. That part of the dream became indistinct. I’m sure he did nothing, except shoulder through the crowd. I think he had just entered. Then that part of the dream seemed to end and the second part began.”
Piece by piece Kennedy went over it, putting it together as if it were a mosaic.
“Now, the woman. You say her face was hidden?”