Anne, who was near the bed, stood up.
“I know,” she said. “I will write a note and send——”
The doctor, a little man with a crusty manner and a heart as tender as a woman’s, interrupted her testily.
“Can’t you go yourself?” he snapped. “I know what servants are when they’re sent on messages. The child is—I’m anxious, and as cross as an old bear,” he concluded.
Anne was already at the door.
“I’ll not be long,” she said. “Miss Haldane will be here if you need her. I’ll send her to you. Nurse is with the baby and Mrs. Sheldon is lying down. She was up most of last night.”
A few moments later Anne was walking down the drive. It was a grey afternoon, lapped in soft clouds, and with a little sad wind in the trees suggestive of autumn, though it was only August.
Anne felt a sensation of depression, a faint foreboding as of impending ill. She told herself that it was merely fatigue. Dickie would get well—she knew he would get well. And yet she did not really think that anxiety regarding Dickie was causing this depression. It was something more remote, something intangible and vague.
She determined not to think about it—to throw aside the slight uneasiness. Yet again and again it crept over her in insidious little waves, despite all her efforts to the contrary.