“What can I do for you?” said Alwyn anxiously. “Are you better? but no—rest a little don’t mind about it yet.”
Edgar still looked at him. Yes, it was Alwyn—perfectly unmistakable—only as much altered as the eight years made inevitable—with the face he remembered so clearly; yes, and with the softened look he had seen in his dream.
He put out his hand, and Alwyn took it timidly, and still with the same shocked, startled look.
“Of course,” he said gently, “I did not know you had been ill, or I would not have written to you, nor risked startling you.”
“I’m not ill,” said Edgar, still rather confusedly. “It’s only my back, you know—quite an old thing.”
“But when—how?”
“I fell downstairs,” said Edgar; “never mind, tell me—”
“Not then? Not that flight? You did fall, I remember. What? then I was the cause.”
Alwyn started up and turned his back on his brother, evidently shocked and overpowered almost beyond control. The meeting was utterly unlike what either of them had fancied to himself as probable.
“Alwyn,” said Edgar, “there’s nothing to mind—I’m quite used to it. It was a mere chance, and it’s not so very bad. I can walk—a little, and I can get out here and have very jolly times, you see.”