Alberdina replied not in three words but in a long voluble speech.
They held their breath.
“Come out,” called the doctor softly.
The sick man had begun to speak again. He seemed to be giving orders.
At the door Phoebe was weeping softly. Her father, restored to himself, was a stranger who spoke in a foreign tongue. Billie was fairly shaking with excitement.
“Do you suppose he’s forgotten English?” she whispered to Richard, who made the most absurd reply that had nothing whatever to do with Phoebe’s father and lost memories.
“I think the doctor had better take you in hand,” said Billie.
“I have an incurable disease,” answered the young man, not in the least ashamed.
Mr. Campbell had joined the doctor and Alberdina at the other end of the house where their voices could not be heard in the sick room. The young surgeons were also in the group. When Billie and Richard came up, the German girl was saying:
“I cannot from the German English mag. He is a German already yet?”