It was tiresome that lung; for whenever it began its tap-lapperty entertainment she felt so ill. Her head ached and her legs seemed to weigh tons; her throat was hot and painful, and something seemed to flutter in the palms of her hands like an imprisoned bird.
More dead than alive she crawled back from her meeting with the princess to the stuffy little house "down in St. Clement's" that her aunt shared with Miss Morecraft, knowing full well that bed would be her portion directly anyone noticed how ill she looked.
Miss Morecraft, a dressmaker of severely respectable and melancholy temperament, was not observant, and it happened that just then she was very busy, as her customers were nearly all servants, and a new dress at Whitsuntide is a matter of sacred ritual in that class.
She did, it is true, remark that Jane-Anne was "a dainty feeder" when the child left her dinner almost untasted, but she did not "hold with pampering children," and having eaten her own dinner with considerable relish, went back to her work, having pressed Jane-Anne into the service to do some basting.
It was not till the child nearly fainted during the afternoon that Miss Morecraft awoke to the fact that Jane-Anne was really ill. She was quite kind-hearted, and was rather shocked that she should have made the child sew when she was evidently unfit for any effort of the kind. She put her to bed, made her a cup of tea, and persuaded the milkman to call and tell Mrs. Dew how matters were.
During the evening, Mrs. Dew "popped round," took Jane-Anne's temperature, rubbed her with liniment, scolded her well, kissed her and tucked her up in bed, and left her unaccountably cheered and comforted.
Next morning a strange, new doctor came. He, too, listened at Jane-Anne's back with his funny double telephone. He, too, shook his head and murmured something about crepitation and congestion, just like the doctor at "Bainbridge's."
"Shall I be able to go back to school?" Jane-Anne croaked eagerly. She was hoarse as a raven.
"When does school begin?" asked the doctor.
"It starts on the 5th of May. I have to go up on the 4th. It's such a long way."