She threw herself on her knees by the bedside, and pressed her wet cheek against his hand.
‘I am come to nurse you, dear husband,’ she said a moment after, standing up again and kissing his forehead. ‘I have only you now.’
His heart sank, and for a moment so great a terror was upon him that he closed his eyes and seemed to pass into utter darkness. But those last words of hers repeated themselves in his mind, and at length they brought a deep solace. Poor little Willie had been the cause of the first coldness between him and Amy; her love for him had given place to a mother’s love for the child. Now it would be as in the first days of their marriage; they would again be all in all to each other.
‘You oughtn’t to have come, feeling so ill,’ she said to him. ‘You should have let me know, dear.’
He smiled and kissed her hand.
‘And you kept the truth from me last night, in kindness.’
She checked herself, knowing that agitation must be harmful to him. She had hoped to conceal the child’s death, but the effort was too much for her overstrung nerves. And indeed it was only possible for her to remain an hour or two by this sick-bed, for she was exhausted by her night of watching, and the sudden agony with which it had concluded. Shortly after Amy’s departure, a professional nurse came to attend upon what the doctor had privately characterised as a very grave case.
By the evening its gravity was in no respect diminished. The sufferer had ceased to cough and to make restless movements, and had become lethargic; later, he spoke deliriously, or rather muttered, for his words were seldom intelligible. Amy had returned to the room at four o’clock, and remained till far into the night; she was physically exhausted, and could do little but sit in a chair by the bedside and shed silent tears, or gaze at vacancy in the woe of her sudden desolation. Telegrams had been exchanged with her mother, who was to arrive in Brighton to-morrow morning; the child’s funeral would probably be on the third day from this.
When she rose to go away for the night, leaving the nurse in attendance, Reardon seemed to lie in a state of unconsciousness, but just as she was turning from the bed, he opened his eyes and pronounced her name.
‘I am here, Edwin,’ she answered, bending over him.