At dusk of the same day the doctor finished his round and rode into Garth. It happened, as it had happened for three days past, that Priscilla was loitering in the roadway fronting Good Intent; it was a habit of hers, and the doctor guessed her motive, and responded to it, with the quiet, charitable humour that marked all his dealings with the dales-folk.
“I’m in rare good humour, Miss Cilla,” he said, drawing rein. “D’ye see those bits of fleecy clouds coming up across the moon?”
“I had not looked at the sky,” she answered absently. “It is ever the same these days, and one grows tired of it.”
“Ay, but ’twill not be the same when you wake to-morrow. I was up at Ghyll this morning—”
“Yes,” put in Cilla, with sudden interest.
“And I pitted my weather lore against Gaunt’s. He said it couldn’t rain if it tried, and I said it was bound to.”
He saw Cilla’s hand go to her heart for a moment, saw the brightness creep into her face. He had known all along that she needed to be told that Gaunt, so far, was well, and it had pleased him to wrap up the news in this talk about the weather.
“They—they are both well at Ghyll?” she asked.
“As sound as can be. I’ve an interest in those two, Miss Cilla. They deserve to come through it all, and somehow I fancy that they will.”
“They say the chances are against it—”