"You have to thank a special Providence interested in your fate that you are not buried alive," he told her cheerfully.
"And so have you," she said solemnly.
"Providence doesn't usually bother much about me; relations have long been strained. Possibly I have been preserved for your sake," he laughed.
"How can you talk in that irreverent way!" she said reproachfully.
"Sorry, if it offends you."
But Joyce fell to weeping. Was it possible that they would ever be found?—they would die of starvation—and what about her baby?
Dalton had much ado to allay all her fears. When it was discovered that they were missing, did she suppose that a stone would be left unturned to trace them? She was to cheer up and show how brave she could be.
"I am not like Honor Bright," she sobbed. "I cannot face such a horrible prospect as a night spent in this ghastly place all among snakes and creeping things!"
The mention of Honor seemed to silence the doctor completely. For some time he was moody and depressed; Joyce was allowed to weep into her hands till exhausted.
Only when it was getting dismally dark did he arouse himself from his abstraction and take up again the task of cheering her.