“Come.”
Someone had knocked at her door. The day nurse opened it, her face no longer solemn. She was smiling as one who had a pleasant message to deliver. Gita’s heart deliquesced.
“Dr. Pelham promised Mr. Bylant he might see you when he waked up; he’s so much better,” said the nurse. “He’s just had his broth and is looking forward to your visit.”
Gita managed to get to her feet and walk steadily over to her dressing-table. She brushed her hair, powdered, and wished that she rouged and used a lip-stick. She lingered over these superfluities of her toilette as long as she dared, with that woman standing behind her. What was she thinking? She had been told the truth, but did she believe it? Why not? She remembered a story she had once read of a woman killing an idolized husband who had returned at night unexpectedly and been mistaken for a burglar.
What did it matter? She rose from her chair and looked at the nurse much as her grandmother may have done when her arrogant instinct of caste was uppermost.
“You may go out into the garden,” she said. “And kindly tell Mrs. Brewster, when she arrives, that I’ll be down presently.”
It is no longer possible for any but the disappearing ladies of the old régime to “sweep by” those they wish to impress or ignore, for the skirt of the period, short hair, and a limp or free swinging carriage, have put an end to such extrinsic aid to importance. But Gita managed to pass those interested eyes with a cold blankness that gave the innocent object of her disdain the feeling she had somehow evaporated, no longer existed. But she was as sensible as most nurses, and quite used to human vagaries.
“You’ll not stay too long?” she suggested mildly. “Ten minutes, I should think. He’s not very strong yet.”
But Gita was crossing the hall, apparently afflicted with deafness.
She hesitated a moment with her hand on the knob, her knees shaking a little. What would be his cue? Well, whatever it was she would take it. Invalids must be humored.