"Thank you for being so candid. It is really no business of mine, but I must try and help that poor girl to bear her sorrow. Shall you see him again?"
"I think so, though I am convinced it is hopeless. Still, I shall look over in the course of the afternoon. Who will put me across?"
"I will."
They got into the boat and pushed off. When he had landed the doctor, Ellison pulled slowly back. His brain was staggering under a multitude of thoughts. What was he to do? What must his duty be now? Should he go away and leave this girl to bear her sorrow alone? Or should he take the bull by the horns, ask her father to be allowed to make her his wife, and trust to Providence for the rest? He didn't know, he couldn't tell—both seemed equally impossible. He resolved to leave it, as he had done before, to the decision of blind Fate. In the meantime he pulled back to the jetty, secured the boat, and went up to the house. Esther saw him pass the window, and came quietly out on the veranda.
"He is sleeping now," she almost whispered; "but it doesn't seem a natural sleep. I cannot tell you how terrified I am about him."
"Poor girl! what can I say to you save that you have my sincerest, my most heartfelt sympathy? If you should want any assistance, remember that I am here to give it you, come what may."
Her only answer was to press the hand that rested on the veranda rail with her soft fingers. Her touch thrilled him through and through, and he went into the hut for lunch with a look in his face that had never been there before. He was beginning to understand his position more clearly now.
Towards the middle of the afternoon he was employing himself among the boats, when he saw her coming breathlessly towards him. He dropped the adze he held in his hand and went to meet her.
"He wants you to come to him," she managed to gasp. "Oh, I don't know how to tell you the agony of fear I'm suffering. He seems so much weaker. Come at once."
She accompanied him into the house, and to the door of her father's chamber. The change in the patient's face staggered him. It was ghastly white and drawn; approaching dissolution was staring from the restless eyes.