Bram patted her hot, twitching hand reassuringly.
“He is quite safe, I’ve no doubt,” he said. “He’s gone out, and he hasn’t come back yet.”
Claire stared at him inquiringly, and frowned as if in perplexity.
“But what has happened?” she asked. “Why does everything seem so strange? Your voice, and the ticking of the clock, and my own voice too—they sound quite different! And my head—oh, it aches so! Have I been ill? Where’s Joan?”
She wandered on thus so quickly from one subject to another that Bram was saved the trouble of finding answers to any of her questions except the last.
“Joan will be back in a little while,” said he. “She’s gone home to see to her children. But she won’t be long.”
“Is she coming back to-night? Why is she coming back to-night?”
“Well, to look after you.”
“Then I have been ill?”
“You’re not very well now,” said Bram gently.