And so a new presence came into Olga's room, and the figure of her dread appeared no more before her waking eyes. Not at first did she realize the change, for it was only fitfully that her brain could register any definite impression. But one day when strong hands lifted her, something of familiarity in the touch caught her wavering intelligence. She looked up and saw a rugged face she knew.
"Dad!" she said incredulously.
"Of course!" said Dr. Jim bluntly. "Only just found that out?"
She made a feeble attempt to cling to him, smiling a welcome through tears. "Oh, Dad, where have you been?"
"I?" said Dr. Jim. "Why, here to be sure, for the past week. Now we won't have any talking. You shut your eyes like a sensible young woman and go to sleep!"
He had always exacted obedience from her. She obeyed him now. "But you won't go away again?" she pleaded.
"Certainly not," he said, and took her hand into his own.
The last thing she knew was the steady pressure of his fingers on her pulse.
From that time her strength began very slowly to return. The suffering grew less and less intense, till at last it visited her only when she tried to think. And this she was sternly forbidden to do by Dr. Jim, whose word was law.
She was like a little child in those days, conscious only of the passing moment, although even then at the back of her mind she was aware of a monstrous shadow that was never wholly absent day or night. Her father and the nurse were the only people she saw during those early days, and she came to watch for the former's coming with a child's eager impatience.