Lady Okehampton anticipated a struggle, remembering how resolutely Vera had resisted this line of treatment three months before; but her niece surprised her by offering no vehement opposition.
"There is absolutely nothing the matter with me," she said, "but if it will please you, Aunt Mildred, I will do as Dr. Tower advises."
"Nothing the matter! And you neither eat nor sleep! Is that nothing?"
"Who told you that I can't sleep?"
"My dear lady, your eyes tell us only too plainly. Insomnia has unmistakable symptoms," said the doctor.
"Yes, it is true," Vera answered wearily. "I seem to have lost the faculty of sleep. It is a habit one soon loses. I lie staring at the daylight, and wondering what it is like to lose count of time."
And then, after a little more doctor's talk, soothing, and rather meaningless, she asked abruptly:
"What time of year is it?"
"Dear child," exclaimed Lady Okehampton, "can you ask?"
"Oh, I have left off writing letters and reading newspapers, and I forget dates. I know the days are getting shorter, because the dawn is so long coming when I lie awake."