“Then will you telegraph to me, and I will go to her? I will also see her father.”
“And—” hesitated Webster; “what will you say to him?”
“Best tell him the truth, I think, and Mr. Churchill will see the wisdom and prudence of keeping it to himself. Besides he had better be present at our marriage.”
“And my aunts?”
“Is there any reason to say anything to them? They know nothing, and they may as well continue in ignorance of a painful story. And now again many thanks.”
So they parted, and Webster went back to his lonely chambers, and thought of what he had done.
“If it is for her happiness,” and then he sighed wearily; somehow he was not quite sure that it would be.
And early the next morning he sent a telegram to May at St. Phillip’s Hospital to say he would be with her by eleven o’clock. May received this telegram with great surprise, for Webster never wrote to her, nor sent telegrams, and when he called it was generally late in the afternoon. But precisely at eleven o’clock a message was sent to her that Mr. Webster was waiting to see her in the sitting-room of the house surgeon, Doctor Brentwood.
She accordingly went there, and found Webster standing, looking grave and pale, and so ill that she instantly remarked on it.
“Are you not well, Mr. Webster?” she said. “You do not look at all well.”