"He can't be too ill to see me," returned Helen desperately, her wrath rising at the notion that she, her father's child, should be classed with "anybody" as though she were a stranger. "I should not disturb him. When he had fever in India—"
Poor Helen! as usual, she had struck the wrong chord, for Mrs. Desmond could not endure any allusion to those old Indian days in which she had had no part.
"Spare me these discussions, Helen," she interrupted sharply. "It is all very well to profess so much affection for your father. Remember that but for you he would not be lying as he is now."
"But for me!"
"Yes. Dr. Russell says that he contracted his illness that evening when, distressed as he was by your disgraceful behaviour, he followed you and brought you home."
"Dr. Russell says so?"
"Yes."
"And if—if—"
"If we lose him, do you mean? In that case, Helen, you will need no words of mine, I should think, to point out the terrible consequences of giving way to temper."
To do Mrs. Desmond justice, she scarcely realized the full meaning of her words. She was not deliberately cruel, but even upon an occasion such as this she could not forget her creed with regard to young people, or let slip the opportunity of pointing a moral. Helen heard her, but said nothing. The girl stood quite still, her hands clasped, her face white and rigid, and her eyes unnaturally distended. She was trying to think; trying to take in the awful fact that it was her deed that had brought this illness upon her father. Was it true, or was she dreaming? she asked herself as all sorts of curious fancies, fancies quite distinct from this absorbing sorrow, rushed through her brain, and the pattern of the wallpaper took fantastic shapes, and the china ornaments on the chimney-piece stood out with curious distinctness, whilst a small ivory figure on the dressing-table seemed suddenly to take life and to force itself upon her attention.