"It has come," said Dr. Fisher in a low voice to Mr. Cabot; "tell your wife," and he bent a professional ear over the white face on the pillow, while Dr. Bryce hurried forward; then brought his head up quickly, a peculiar light in the sharp eyes back of the spectacles. "He is sleeping!"
* * * * *
Polly was sitting, a half-hour by the bedside, Pickering's thin fingers still tightly grasping her hand. They had made her comfortable in an easy chair, Jasper bringing one of Mrs. Higby's biggest cushions for her to lean her head against. He now stood at the side of her chair, Phronsie curled up on the floor at her feet.
"Don't stay." Polly's lips seemed to frame the words rather than speak them, looking up at him.
He shook his head, resting his hand on the back of the chair. Polly tried to smile up a bit of comfort into his eyes. "Jasper loved Pickering so," she said to herself, "that he cannot leave him; but oh! he looks so dreadfully, I wish he would go and rest," and she began to have a worried look at once.
"What is it?" asked Jasper, catching the look at once, and bending to whisper in her ear.
"You will be sick if you do not go and rest," whispered back Polly.
"I cannot—don't ask it." Jasper brought the words out sharply, with just a bitter tone to them.
"He thinks it is strange that I ask it; he is so fond of Pickering," said Polly to herself. "And now I have grieved him—O, dear!"
"I won't leave Pickering," she said, lifting her brown eyes quickly.