“No, you won’t,” said Eunice, with decision. “You will just drop everything and lie down on your bed for an hour and half. I can do without you for so long, and it will make all the difference to the comfort with which you can get through the day. Don’t worry about the time to get up; I will call you, I promise, so you can go to sleep with a clear conscience.”
“Oh, but it seems too bad to do that when you are here! I want to be with you all the time,” said Bertha; but her objections to resting were only half-hearted, and five minutes after she had put her head on the pillow of her unmade bed she was fast asleep, and did not wake until she roused to see Eunice standing beside her holding a steaming cup of coffee just ready for drinking.
“Have I slept too long?” asked Bertha, in alarm, for it seemed to her that she had been lying there for a very long time.
“No, dear, the time I gave you is barely up yet; but Mrs. Ellis wanted you to go into her room when you did wake, so I thought that you would be easier in your mind to be wakened in good time,” said Eunice, who looked very warm from her active exertions at the stove.
“Isn’t she so well?” asked Bertha, in alarm. Grace stayed in her room this morning, because that would leave the kitchen a little freer for all the bustle of feeding that had to be got ready there.
“I think that she is all right; but she had a letter that she wanted you to see, and you need not hurry her if she wants to talk it out with you, for I can manage very well for a little longer,” said Eunice, in the unflurried tone which always made her seem such a restful person.
Bertha jerked her head in token that she understood, but she was scalding herself too badly with the coffee for speech just then.
Grace had a twinkle of fun in her eyes, for even the tragedy of her condition could not wholly dim the brightness of her spirit. There was an open letter fixed in one of her helpless hands, and she was looking at it when Bertha came in at the door.
“Are you better, poor thing?” asked Grace, who found it so much more natural to be sorry for other people than for herself.
“Yes, thank you; I feel much more fit now that I have been to sleep. What have you there? Something that you wish me to read to you?” asked Bertha, pointing to the letter.