“I don’t know,” said Miss Fortescue. “Jeannie, what is the matter with you?”
Jeannie had sat down on a chair in the landing, and was looking in front of her with wide, unseeing eyes.
“I may have given it to the baby,” she said.
“Jeannie, don’t be foolish,” said Miss Fortescue. “Oh, my dear, be sensible. I have already written to Dr. Maitland saying that you had been with probable typhoid cases, and asking what precautions one ought to take. I thought it probable that you would be uneasy about the baby, so I also asked whether it was possible that you had carried infection. That was about half an hour ago; I expect the answer every moment.”
“Oh, Aunt Em,” said Jeannie, coming close to her, “you think it is all right, don’t you? You don’t think I have been stupid or incautious?”
“I think you are being very stupid now,” said Aunt Em. “Ah, here is Pool.”
The butler came upstairs and handed Miss Fortescue a note; she glanced at it quickly.
“Such a risk of carrying typhoid as the one you mention is inconceivable,” she read, “and a baby of a few months old having it at all is unknown to the medical profession.”
She passed the note to Jeannie, who glanced at it.
“Oh, thank God, thank God!” she cried. “Aunt Em, I am going to see Dr. Maitland at once.”