Her lips twitched as she poured some beef-tea into my feeder.
"If you sit up again I shall give up the case."
Her voice reminded me of the stone wall I had smashed against, and I told her so; but she was not to be moved.
"Will you give me your faithful promise that you will not sit up again? I am responsible to Dr. Renton and Mr. Rovell. I have nursed Mr. Rovell's cases for years, and I do not wish to lose his work."
She stood over me like an angel with a flaming sword.
"I promise, nursey, dear," I said meekly. "But you won't take my manuscript book from me? I can write quite easily lying down. You see, it has stiff covers."
"You can keep that," she conceded. "Are you doing French exercises?"
"No," I said gravely. "At present I am writing what you might call 'patience exercises.' When I am at work I forget how long it is before Mr. Westover will be home. I forget my back. I forget General Macintosh and my other worries. I am so absorbed in keeping my spelling and grammar in order that I have no time for other matters. You see, if I were to di—go before my husband, he might wish to see these exercises, and I should not like him to smile at my mistakes."
"You are not going before Mr. Westover," she said briskly. "All my patients think they are going to die. I am not altogether sorry, as they are so sorry for themselves that it keeps them absorbed and out of mischief. Were they not taken up in picturing their husbands flinging themselves on to their graves in a frenzy of grief they might be picking their bandages off."
I giggled and choked into my beef-tea.