“They couldn’t get along without her at the theatre,” groaned the husband.
“I’d suggest waiting a day or two. Believe me, my dear sir, the child will pull through. I will do all that can be done, sir. Rest easy.” His manner was quite different, now that he knew the importance of his patient. He readjusted his glasses and cleared his throat. “I hope to have the pleasure of seeing Mrs.—er—your wife, sir.”
“She has a regular physician in town,” said Harvey, politely. 75
For two weeks he nursed Phoebe, day and night, announcing to the doctor in the beginning that his early training made him quite capable. There were moments when he thought she was dying, but they passed so quickly that his faith in the physician’s assurances rose above his fears. Acting on the purely unselfish motive that Nellie would be upset by the news, he kept the truth from her, and she went on singing and dancing without so much as a word to distress her. Two Sundays passed; her own lamentable illness kept her away from the little house in Tarrytown.
“If we tell her about Phoebe,” said Harvey to Bridget and Annie, “she’ll go all to pieces. Her heart may stop, like as not. Besides, she’d insist on coming out and taking care of her, and that would be fatal to the show. She’s never had diphtheria. She’d be sure to catch it. It goes very hard with grown people.”
“Have you ever had it, sir?” asked Annie, anxiously.
“Three times,” said Harvey, who hadn’t thought of it up to that moment.
When the child was able to sit up he put in his time reading “David Copperfield” to her. 76
Later on he played “jacks” with her and cut pictures out of the comic supplements. By the end of the month he was thinner and more “peaked,” if anything, than she. Unshaven, unshorn, unpressed was he, but he was too full of joy to give heed to his own personal comforts or requirements.
His mind was beginning to be sorely troubled over one thing. Now that Phoebe was well and getting strong he realised that Nellie would be furious when she found out how ill the child had been and how she had been deceived. He considered the advisability of keeping it from her altogether, swearing every one to secrecy, but there was the doctor’s bill to be paid. When it came to paying that Nellie would demand an explanation. It was utterly impossible for him to pay it himself. Thinking over his unhappy position, he declared, with a great amount of zeal, but no vigour, that he was going to get a job and be independent once more. More than that, when he got fairly well established in his position (he rather leaned toward the drug or the restaurant business) he would insist on Nellie giving up her arduous stage work and settling down to enjoy a life of comfort 77 and ease—even luxury, if things went as he meant them to go.