CHAPTER III. THE SICK CHAMBER.
In the course of a month there was a good deal more of light in the smile with which my darling greeted me when I entered her room in the morning. Her pain was greatly gone, but the power of moving her limbs had not yet even begun to show itself.
One day she received me with a still happier smile than I had yet seen upon her face, put out her thin white hand, took mine and kissed it, and said, “Papa,” with a lingering on the last syllable.
“What is it, my pet?” I asked.
“I am so happy!”
“What makes you so happy?” I asked again.
“I don’t know,” she answered. “I haven’t thought about it yet. But everything looks so pleasant round me. Is it nearly winter yet, papa? I’ve forgotten all about how the time has been going.”
“It is almost winter, my dear. There is hardly a leaf left on the trees—just two or three disconsolate yellow ones that want to get away down to the rest. They go fluttering and fluttering and trying to break away, but they can’t.”
“That is just as I felt a little while ago. I wanted to die and get away, papa; for I thought I should never be well again, and I should be in everybody’s way.—I am afraid I shall not get well, after all,” she added, and the light clouded on her sweet face.
“Well, my darling, we are in God’s hands. We shall never get tired of you, and you must not get tired of us. Would you get tired of nursing me, if I were ill?”