"Is it your mother?" asked Rosanna.
Claire shivered violently. "Yes," she breathed.
"Oh, Claire!" said Rosanna, her own tears wetting Claire's forehead. "Oh, Claire, is it as bad as that? Is your mother so dreadfully ill? I thought she just had nervous prostration or something like that. That is what most people have, isn't it? I am so sorry! So dreadfully sorry! Perhaps there is a mistake. Sometimes doctors think people are awfully sick and going to—going to die, and then they get well as ever."
Claire laughed a sudden, jangling, harsh laugh that frightened Rosanna more than her sobs. She turned her lips close to Rosanna's ear, as though she hated to breathe aloud the words she struggled to utter.
"Mother is not going to die," she said finally. "She is insane!"
CHAPTER XI
Rosanna gave a little cry of sympathy and pain, but she did not speak and Rosanna simply held her close and patted her back, whispering, "There, there!" over and over until at last the cries subsided, and Claire, spent and tired, lay quite still.
"Are they sure they can't cure her?" Rosanna whispered finally.
"There is no hope," said Claire. "She seems to get worse all the time. She scarcely knows daddy now, and doesn't seem to care whether he comes to see her or not. For a long time she wanted to see him."