Daddy's Girl

by L. T. Meade

For the first two days after his return Ogilvie scarcely left Sibyl. During all that time he asked no questions of outsiders. He did not even inquire for the doctor’s verdict. Where was the good of asking a question which could only receive one answer? The look on the child’s face was answer enough to her father.

Meanwhile, outside in the grounds, the bazaar went on. The marquee was full of guests, the band played cheerily, the notable people from all the country round arrived in carriages, and bought the pretty things from the different stall-holders and went away again.

The weather was balmy, soft and warm, and the little skiffs with their gay flags did a large trade on the river. Lord Grayleigh was one of the guests, returning to town, it is true, at night, but coming back again early in the morning. He heard that Ogilvie had returned and was naturally anxious to see him, but Ogilvie sent word that he could not see anyone just then. Grayleigh understood. He shook his head when Mrs. Ogilvie herself brought him the message.

“This cuts him to the heart,” he said; “I doubt if he will ever be the same man again.”

“Oh, Lord Grayleigh, what nonsense!” said the wife. “My dear husband was always eccentric, but as Sibyl recovers so will he recover his equanimity. It is a great shock to him, of course, to see her as she is now, dear little soul. But I cannot tell you how bad I was at first; indeed, I was in bed for nearly a week. I had a sort of nervous attack—nervous fever, the doctor said. But I got over it. I know now so assuredly that the darling child is getting well that I am never unhappy about her. Philip will be just the same by-and-by.”

Grayleigh made no reply. He gave Mrs. Ogilvie one of his queer glances, turned on his heel and whistled softly to himself. He muttered under his breath that some women were poor creatures, and he was sorry for Ogilvie, yes, very sorry.

Grayleigh was also anxious with regard to another matter, but that anxiety he managed so effectually to smother that he would not even allow himself to think that it had any part in Ogilvie’s curious unwillingness to see him.

At this time it is doubtful whether Ogilvie did refuse to see Grayleigh in any way on account of the mine, for during those two days he had eyes, ears, thoughts, and heart for no one but Sibyl. When anyone else entered her room he invariably went out, but he quickly returned, smiling as he did so, and generally carrying in his hand some treasure which he had brought for her across the seas. He would then draw his chair near the little, white bed and talk to her in light and cheerful strains, telling her wonderful things he had seen during his voyage, of the sunsets at sea, of a marvelous rainbow which once spanned the sky from east to west, and of many curious mirages which he had witnessed. He always talked to the child of nature, knowing how she understood nature, and those things which are the special heritage of the innocent of the earth, and she was as happy during those two peaceful days as it was ever the lot of little mortal to be.

But, in particular, when Mrs. Ogilvie entered the sick room did Ogilvie go out. He had during those two days not a single word of private talk with his wife. To Miss Winstead he was always polite and tolerant; to nurse he was more than polite, he was kind, and to Sibyl he was all in all, everything that father could be, everything that love could imagine. He kept himself, his wounded conscience, his fears, his heavy burden of sin in abeyance for the sake of the fast-fleeting little life, because he willed, with all the strength of his nature, to give the child every comfort that lay in his power during her last moments.

But the peaceful days could not last long. They came to an end with the big bazaar. The band ceased to play on the lawn, the pleasure boats ceased to ply up and down the Thames, the lovely Indian summer passed into duller weather, the equinoctial gales visited the land, and Ogilvie knew that he must brace himself for something he had long made up his mind to accomplish. He must pass out of this time of quiet into a time of storm. He had known from the first that he must do this, but until the bazaar came to an end, by a sort of tacit consent, neither the child nor the man talked of the gold mine.