“Yes, she’s down with scarlet-fever—several of the servants too,” he said, and went to the gas to melt some sealing-wax.
The girl went home with a grave face. Apart from regret at the old lady’s illness, there was the fear that she herself might have caught it. She went straight to her room and examined her tongue anxiously at the glass; then she held one wrist gravely with a finger and thumb, and asked herself if she felt feverish.
But the pulse was calm, the tongue healthily red,—she laughed at herself.
“I never felt better in my life,” she said aloud.
After some deliberation she decided she would not tell Meg. “She’d only worry, and prepare herself for my immediate funeral,” she thought. “I should be all over red spots by now if I had got it.”
So that is how it happened, when ten days had gone and she still felt exuberantly well, that the silver pen returned and the fascinator was commenced. One could not wear sackcloth for ever.
[222]
]She even borrowed “Comin’ thro’ the Rye” and “Joan” from a girl-friend; and “Rasselas” and “Sartor Resartus” slipped down behind the table and were forgotten.
But she had intended all the time to consult Alan. He had been away for almost a fortnight in Victoria, or she would have asked him before.
The afternoon he returned, and as soon as she could get him away from Meg, she asked him if he would come down into the garden with her, as she wanted to ask him something very particularly.
The young doctor laughed, and put himself very much at her service.