But Nell looked at him with honest, unembarrassed eyes which disarmed all suspicion.
“Father was sick for a long time before he died; but that was years ago. Since then I’ve only had dogs and horses to nurse when they weren’t well, for nothing ever ailed granfer.”
“Except in temper, I suppose. I know the sort,” he said, with a grim laugh at his own joke; then he asked quickly, “Is your mother dead too?”
“Yes. She died when I was a little girl,” Nell replied. Then she asked, after a moment of hesitation, “Will you please tell me about the other girl—Miss Lorimer, I mean—and why she did not come?”
“She ought to have come, or let me know that she couldn’t do as she had promised,” the doctor said, with a frown. “But, seeing what trouble they are in, it is not wonderful she lost her head and forgot. She is Gertrude Lorimer, the eldest of Abe Lorimer’s children. Two of her brothers, bright promising boys, were buried last Sunday. I had to go to Lorimer’s Clearing the day before yesterday, and I asked Gertrude if she could come and take care of Mrs. Munson for a few days, and she promised that she would come over yesterday morning, so I rested easy in my mind about my patient. But, to my dismay, when I got to Lorimer’s Clearing this morning, I found that Mrs. Lorimer had been taken ill yesterday, and was in bed, and that Gertrude had simply forgotten all about her promise to come here.”
“Poor girl!” murmured Nell, sympathetically.
The doctor frowned, shook his head, but finally relented enough to admit that Gertrude was deserving of some little pity, even although she had forgotten her promise.
“I will admit that I should not have found it easy to forgive her, if Mrs. Munson had died from want of nursing. On the other hand, if she had sent me word, I don’t know where I could have found a woman who could be spared to come here for the work.”
“You ought to be grateful to her for not letting you know then, because now you have not had to worry about it so long,” Nell said, smiling, as she prepared a hasty meal for the doctor.
But he was not disposed to admit so much, and shook his head a great deal while he ate his lunch. He talked to Nell in a cheerful, friendly fashion, but asked her no more questions about herself, rightly divining that there was trouble behind, of which she did not find it easy to speak. He was fearful, too, of scaring her away from a place where she was so badly needed, so he took pains to reassure her.