At a short distance from the Red House they were overtaken by Mr. Plunkett, who with an anxious face was walking up swiftly from the village.
"David himself has gone for the doctor," said Nessa, "and if he does not find yours, he will ride on at once to Ballyboden; he will not come back without one." Her voice conveyed all the sympathy that she felt. It was not a moment to put it into words.
But evidently Mr. Plunkett did not yet know of his child's danger.
"What?" he said hoarsely, trying to seem unmoved.
"You have not heard—that she is rather worse?" asked Nessa, steadying her voice in order to break the news as gently as possible.
But Mr. Plunkett was not a man to have news broken to him. A sort of gray color spread over his face. Standing quite still before Nessa he seemed to pierce her through with his eyes.
"Is she dying?" he asked. He stood erect as usual. He tried to keep his face in the same unrelaxed mold. For all his pain he could not bear that these strangers should see him suffer. But the cold, stern voice was strangely broken; in spite of himself such a dumb agony of suspense was in his eyes that Nessa, not daring to speak untruly, was moved with sudden sympathy to put her hand in his. The touch of her fingers, the sorrow in her face, conveyed the answer she could not have framed in words.
"Not dead?" he forced his lips to say, while almost unconsciously his hand closed tightly upon hers.
"No; oh, no," she answered quickly, "and the doctor will soon be here, perhaps—"
But he waited for no more. With a few rapid strides he was in the house, and Nessa, not liking just then to enter, remained with the children where he had left her.