‘I heard my father tell Mr and Mrs Courtney so,’ she said, after a pause.
Her reticence alarmed Maraquita. She didn’t like Liz’s calm, collected manner and short replies.
‘Well, I suppose your father doesn’t tell lies,’ she answered brusquely.
‘I have always believed him,’ said Liz sadly. ‘But, Quita, you have talked enough. Your face is quite flushed. Keep quiet, like a good girl, or you may not be able to return home with your parents, and that will be a great disappointment to them.’
She took up her work again, and commenced sewing, whilst Quita lay still, but with a palpitating heart, as she wondered what Liz could have meant by evading her question. Could she have read her friend’s thoughts at that moment, her curiosity would have been satisfied, though not in the way she desired. Liz was marvelling, with a feeling of contempt, as she stitched industriously at her calico, how any woman could bring a child into the world, lawfully or unlawfully, and think only of her safety afterwards, without one thought for her own flesh and blood; the flesh and blood, too, of some one who ought to be so much dearer to her than herself. She sat there, nervously anticipating every moment to feel Quita’s little hand slip into hers, and to hear her quivering voice ask for news of her child.
Liz would have loved her a thousand times more for the weakness. She would have forgiven her all her frailty and wickedness in one moment, and taken her into her arms with a loving assurance that her infant should be as carefully guarded as the secret of its birth. But no such appeal came from the young mother. On the contrary, she seemed anxious and worried about herself alone, and the only excuse which Liz had been able to conjure up for her sinfulness, grew weaker and weaker with the passing moments. But perhaps, thought Lizzie, with her ever ready charity, perhaps Quita had learned all she wished to know from Dr Fellows, and her own hasty judgment of her was a grievous wrong. But both the girls felt there was a barrier raised between their intercourse that had never been there before, and it was a relief to them to hear the sing-song chant of the palanquin bearers as they came through the grove to fetch Maraquita away.
In another minute Dr Fellows appeared upon the threshold, accompanied by Mr and Mrs Courtney, and Quita was in her parents’ arms. In their delight at receiving her again, they almost forgot to ask for any particulars concerning her illness.
‘Oh, my dear child!’ exclaimed her mother impressively, ‘I hope you have thanked Dr Fellows as you should do for all his attention to you. I don’t believe anybody could have brought you round so quickly as he has. Your father and I were dining with the Governor, Sir Russell Johnstone, last evening, and he said that Dr Martin of the Fort had told him no cases of fever had been declared convalescent under three weeks. And here you are, you see, almost well again in a third of the time.’
‘Not so fast, my dear madam,’ interposed the Doctor. ‘As you are naturally anxious to have her under your own care, I can pronounce Miss Courtney to be sufficiently recovered to be moved to the White House, but I shall visit her every day, and it will be some weeks before she is completely off the sick list. But she must eat as much as she can, and do as little as she need, and she will soon be strong again.’
‘But if you think it would be more prudent for her to remain here a little longer under your care, my dear Fellows, we are quite willing to leave her,’ said Mr Courtney.