The nurse stared at her a moment, then went swiftly to the door of the room where Sandie lay, opened it, and passed through. In some half-minute she came out again, closing it softly behind her.
“Why, he’s getting some natural sleep,” she said, “and he hasn’t closed his eyes the last three nights. And his breathing is quiet, and there is no more rigor. Yet his temperature came down to below normal from high fever an hour ago. Or could I have made a mistake?”
Cochrane smiled at her.
“Yes, nurse; I think there has been a mistake,” he said. “But he’s all right now, and you are satisfied, are you? Good night. Sandie won’t wake for the next twelve hours, I think.”
The two went downstairs again. Thurso was still up in his bedroom, and, but that the table had been cleared, the room was just as they had left it an hour ago. But it seemed to Maud as if some huge change had taken place. What it was she could hardly formulate yet; she only knew that the whole aspect and nature of things was different. Then she turned to Cochrane.
“I don’t understand,” she said; “I am bewildered.”
“You understood just now,” said he, “when you told Sandie his faith was making him well. That is all. It’s just the truest and simplest and only thing in this world. But I’ll get home now, Lady Maud. I’ve—I’ve got more to do.”
Maud felt fearfully excited. All her emotions, all her beliefs and aspirations, were strung up to their highest by what she had seen. She had seen what she had seen; Nurse Miles had seen too. It was all incredible, but it had happened. She could not call it impossible. And if this had taken place, why should not more?
“Ah, make them all well!” she cried. “Stop this dreadful false belief of suffering and illness, since you say it is false.”
“But is it not false?” he asked. “Did it not vanish before the truth?”