“I’ll find it, and I’ll get what’s wanted. You go back to him,” said the boy, vigorously licking his thumb in order to turn the pages faster.
He heated water for her, and carried it upstairs, and together they plunged little, gasping Cecil into the bath, and watched his terrified face slowly lose its blueish tinge and his laboured breathing gradually become natural.
“He’s better now, Mrs. Aviolet,” said Felix consolingly. “I’ll run out and get the doctor for you, though, if you like.”
“You are a brick. I’ll never forget it, never! Look, he’ll be asleep directly. I don’t think we need have the doctor now, though I’ll have to send for him to-morrow. Go back and get some sleep, Felix. You’ve been so kind and such a help.”
“Don’t mention it, Mrs. Aviolet,” said Felix politely.
He went back to his mattress beside the safe.
Rose sat by the side of the cot where Cecil, still rolled in his dressing-gown under the sheet and blankets, lay asleep against his pillow.
Her yellow hair, thick and straight, kept on falling across her forehead, and she pushed it back, absently, again and again.
Her eyes were fixed upon the child, her thoughts, in her inexperience, full of the terror of losing him.
“He wasn’t ever ill at Squires ... and if he had been, there’d have been Dr. Lucian, and no difficulty about hot water, either, whatever time of night.... Felix was good! The idea of a lad like him getting the mustard for the bath, and helping me, and everything. But if he hadn’t been there, I’d have been properly done—I bet Uncle A. wouldn’t be any more use than a poke in the eye with a dirty stick, and I suppose the girl sleeps like the dead, the same as all servants. That old Dawson would have come, though, at Squires ... and they’d have had ipecacuanha in the house, for certain, and anything one wanted. A fire in his room, most likely, on a night like this. And Cecil was happier there than he is here!”