Shortly after, Mr. Randolph was informed that Nina had had a brief but severe attack of rheumatic fever, and he paid her a hurried visit. He wondered at the change in her, but did not suspect the truth.
“She is pining for Thorpe, I suppose,” he said to Miss Shropshire. “I cannot understand his silence; and now God knows when we’ll hear from him, unless he managed to get North before April 19th. Something has happened, I am afraid. Poor child, she was not born under a lucky star! Is she all right otherwise?”
“Yes, it looks as if she were cured. But when she goes to San Francisco, she had better stay with me for a time. I don’t think her mother’s society would be the best thing for her while she is so despondent.”
“By all means. And that detestable Clough?”
“He is really a first-rate doctor, and has been devotion itself.”
“Very well: I shall send him a handsome cheque. But if he has any matrimonial designs, let him look out. Don’t imagine I am blind. A man does not neglect a fresh practice for cousinly affection. I cannot suppose for a moment that she would tolerate him, but when a woman is listless and despondent, and thinks that all her prospects of happiness are over, there’s no telling what she will do; particularly if the besieger has the tenacity of a bull dog. I’d rather see her in her coffin than married to Richard Clough.”
Miss Shropshire was very anxious to return to San Francisco. She loved Nina Randolph; but she had immured herself in the cause of friendship long enough, and thought that her afflicted friend would be quite as well off where distractions were more abundant. When she suggested return, Nina acquiesced indifferently, and Mrs. Atkins packed the trunks with a hearty good-will. Dr. Clough brought a hack, at great expense, from Napa, and packed her into it as if she were a baby. As it drove off, she looked through the window up to the forest where her baby lay. She had not been strong enough to climb to the grave. She knew that she should never see it.