He looked at his watch. “I think not quite. Is there anything of importance to fill the one remaining?”
“Nothing whatever—except to mention your fee.” The guest receded gracefully from the door.
“If the patient will follow directions I'll ask no fee. If he doesn't I'll exact one when I see him again. Forgive my haste, Miss—Halstead?”
“Hempstead,” corrected the caller crisply. “Don't mention it, Doctor—Brown. Good night.”
The Chesters' guest lingered on the porch before going in to report the failure of her mission. She was still lingering there when the Green Imp, carrying no open-shirted mechanic, but a properly clothed professional gentleman and a severely dressed professional lady, whirled away down the drive.
“He really was going somewhere in a hurry, then,” admitted the guest. “In which case I can't be quite so offended. I wonder if that nurse enjoys her trips with him—when his mouth doesn't happen to be shut like a steel trap.”
If she could have seen the pair on the train which presently bore them flying away across the state, she would hardly have envied either of them. Between abstraction on the one side and reserve an the other, they exchanged less conversation than two strangers might have done. When Miss Mathewson's eyes drooped with weariness her companion made her as comfortable as he could and bade her rest. His own eyes were untouched by slumber: he stared straight before him or out into the night, seeing nothing but a white farmhouse far ahead, where his anxious thoughts were waiting for his body to catch up.
“Are they much sick, Zeke?”
“Wal, I dunno hardly, Red.—You goin' to drive? They're pretty lively, them blacks. Ain't used to comin' to the station at two o'clock in the mornin'. Your ma's been worryin' about your pa for a consid'able spell, and now that she's took down so severe herself he's gone to pieces some. Miss Ellen'll be glad to see you.”
The blacks covered the mile from the station as they had never covered it before, and Burns was in the house five minutes before they had expected him.