“In a back chamber of the alehouse of the ‘Sceptre.’ There, question no farther. Your duty now is but to eat and sleep.”
For many hours Hugh obeyed that command unquestioningly, and pained himself only to take the merest outer observation of what went on about him. A small pompous man in black, who dressed his wounds and left ill-tasting drugs came twice to the room; the drawer, Martin, came often with food; and Strangwayes was there always, right at his bedside, whenever he chose to call upon him. For the rest, there was the crackling fire to watch, and the window. Once when he looked to it of a morning he saw it thick with white frost, and Strangwayes, coming to the pallet, flung a cloak over him as he lay. Hugh watched him an instant, then broke out irrelevantly, “Dick, have I been very ill?”
“Just a bit,” Strangwayes replied, in his dryest tone.
“From the duel, was it not?” Hugh pursued; then suddenly: “Tell me, how did it fare with Bellasis? Has he recovered before me?”
“He is recovered,” Strangwayes answered, and hastened away to mend the fire.
But four and twenty hours later Hugh attacked his friend with a new query: “Why does not Frank or George come to visit me now? I think I be strong enough.”
“Wait a time longer,” Strangwayes urged; so Hugh waited and pondered much. For his head did not ache now whenever he tried to think, so he went over all he remembered of the last days, and concluded on this and that till he was ready to ask farther questions.
The late cold that made the window white had somewhat abated, when for the first time Strangwayes propped Hugh up in bed with two cushions behind him and a cloak about his shoulders. “I want to ask you something,” Hugh began then, soberly, “I am quite strong, you see. Now tell me, Dick, did I not hurt Bellasis?”
“Yes,” Strangwayes answered, setting his face grimly to the front.
“Sorely?” Hugh urged. “Tell me, Dick.”