The fog seemed to be clearing away; through it he could hazily perceive the Viscount’s face, which seemed, in some peculiar fashion, to be suspended above him.
“That’s the dandy!” Ulverston said. “Come, now, old fellow!”
Ulverston appeared to have some need of his instant services, which made it imperative for him to try feebly to respond to the appeal. He found himself to be without the strength to thrust away the hand that was preventing him from struggling to raise himself; and he was, on the whole, relieved to hear the other voice say: “Pray do not talk to him any more, my lord! He will do very well if you let him alone.”
He thought this the most sensible remark he had ever heard, and tried to say so. Raising his leaden eyelids again, he found that Ulverston’s face had disappeared, and that it was Miss Morville’s which now hung over him. She seemed to be wiping his brow with a wet cloth; he could smell lavender-water. It was pleasant, but he felt it to be quite wrong for her to be sponging his face. He muttered: “You must not! I cannot think ...”
“There is no need for you to think, my lord. You have only to lie still,” replied Miss Morville, in a voice which reminded him so forcibly of his old nurse that he attempted no further argument, but closed his eyes again.
He desired nothing more than to slide back into the comfortable darkness from which Ulverston’s voice had dragged him, but it had receded. He was aware of being in bed, and soon realized that it must be his own bed at Stanyon, and not, as he had mistily supposed, in some billet in southern France. He heard Miss Morville desire Turvey to tighten a bandage, felt himself gently moved, and was conscious of pain somewhere in the region of his left shoulder.
Ulverston’s voice asked anxiously: “Is it bleeding still?”
“Very little now, my lord,” replied Miss Morville.
“How much longer does Chard mean to be?” Ulverston exclaimed, in a fretting tone. “What if that damned sawbones should be away from home?”
The Earl found these questions disturbing, for they made him think that there was something he must try to remember: something that flickered worryingly at the back of his clouded mind. The effort to collect his thoughts made him frown. Then he heard Miss Morville suggest that Ulverston should go downstairs to receive Dr. Malpas. She added, in a low tone: “Pray remember, my lord, that we do not know how this accident occurred, but think it may have been a poacher!”