Helen sat in stricken silence.
"It augurs well that he was able to stand the pleasure of his home-coming," continued Dr. Dick. "He must be extraordinarily better, if you noticed nothing unusual. Possibly he slept during the night-crossing. Also, I gave him some stuff to take on the way back, intended to clear his brain and calm him generally. Did he seem to you quite normal?"
Then Helen rose and stood before him with clasped hands.
"He seemed to me quite normal," she said, "because I had no idea of anything else. But now that I know the truth, of course I realise at once that he was not so. And, oh, Dr. Dick, I had a terrible scene with Ronnie!"
Dick stood up.
"Tell me," he said.
"I told Ronnie that he was utterly, preposterously, and altogether selfish, and that I was ashamed of him."
"Whew! You certainly did not mince matters," said Dr. Dick. "What had poor old Ronnie done?"
"He had talked, from the moment of his return, of very little save the 'cello he has brought home. He had suggested that it might amuse me to put it into a bassinet. Then when at last tea was over, he proposed, as the most delightful proceeding possible, that we should adjourn to the studio, and that I should sit and listen while he made a first attempt to play his 'cello—which, by the way, he calls, the 'Infant of Prague,' explaining to me that it is the nicest infant that ever was."
"Oh, that confounded Infant!" exclaimed Dr. Dick. "I have hated it from the first! But really, Mrs. West "—he looked puzzled—"all this was no doubt enthusiasm misplaced. But then Ronnie always is a perfect infant himself, where new toys are concerned. You can hardly realise how much he has looked forward to showing you that 'cello. His behaviour also proved a decided tendency to self-absorption; but there the artistic temperament comes in, which always creates a world of its own in which it dwells content, often at the expense of duties and obligations connected with outer surroundings. We all know that this is Ronnie's principal failing. But—excuse me for saying so—it hardly deserved quite so severe an indictment from you."