“I am sure I don’t know, unless you tell me the premises of action.”
“I cannot, Frank! Dear Frank, I cannot. The memory of the dead should be sacred; so should the differences of——I cannot tell you, Frank.”
“Hist! Here’s the doctor.”
Old Doctor Shaw at this moment passed through the parlor, on his way to visit his patient.
Major Clifton accompanied him up stairs to her chamber.
When they reached her bed-chamber, he noticed that the smile had departed from her lips, and the color from her cheeks. The old physician put on his spectacles, and looked scrutinizingly at her face and hands, laid his hand upon her forehead and bosom, to get the temperature, felt her pulse, felt her hands and feet, and finally pronounced her to be doing very well.
“May she not be wakened up, sir?” asked Clifton, almost selfish in his impatience for a reconciliation.
“By no means. She must be let alone—nature is her best physician, and the sleep she prescribes, her best medicine.”
“But, sir, I have something of vital importance to communicate to her!” persisted Clifton.
“Sir, it may be of vital importance to you, but it would be of fatal importance to her, should you rouse her to communicate it, whatever it is.”