Arthur informed them he was "Prince Arthur" going to open and inspect "The Orphanage," and pretended to be very grand. Christina and he had kept up this little joke whenever she had made her flying visits to No. 8. He had told her that, as he was such an august personage, he must not go till everything was ready; but he had kept away with great difficulty, as the accounts from Nellie and Walter made him long to be able to talk it over and enjoy it with them. They had been backwards and forwards a good deal—Nellie to help in suggesting and arranging, and Walter to hang pictures, move furniture, and assist generally in a most wonderful way, Christina thought; for she had never before met a gentleman who could "use his hands," as she called it.
Walter was invaluable, and Ada, who was chief "aide-de-camp," used to suggest sending for him whenever the least difficulty arose. He looked in, however, on them nearly every day, and Miss Arbuthnot, who was ignorant of the episode of that walk along the shore, heartily wished that the two whom she considered so suitable for each other should find it out. She, too, remembered the past; but she had wisdom enough neither to refer to it nor to make any remark as to the present. She welcomed Walter gladly, and thought the day seemed rather blank which had not brought his pleasant face. Did Christina think so? If so she kept it to herself; for nobody could guess.
As Dr. and Mrs. Arundel drove along Seymour Street on this bright afternoon of their visit to Christina, the carriage was brought to a stand by a crowd collected round some object at the side of the road.
"I wonder what it is?" said Mrs. Arundel, leaning forward anxiously.
"I do not suppose it is much," said Dr. Arundel; "but I will go and see."
He got out, and pressed into the crowd. "What is it?" he asked.
"A woman fainted," was the reply.
"Let me in then," he answered; "I am a doctor."
The by-standers made way for him, and he found himself in a moment by the side of a woman who was lying on the curbstone, her head supported by the friendly knee of an elderly woman who had been passing when she fell. Even in her fainting condition she was clutching an infant, who was crying painfully, in her wasted arms.
Dr. Arundel begged the people to stand further away to give her air, while he dipped his handkerchief in a jug of water which someone had brought, and bathed her face and hands, and then sent a message to his carriage for his wife's smelling-bottle. Gradually the poor creature began to revive; and as she did so, she held her baby tighter to her breast.