Mrs. Hunt received none of her friends that day, being busy "getting things to rights"; and for a like reason she absented herself from her child's sickroom, content with sending up Jeannie, now and then, to inquire how she was getting on. In the abject loneliness that oppressed her, when the first violence of passions had spent itself, Sarah would have been relieved in some measure by the society of this pet sister, the sole object upon earth, besides her father, that had ever repaid her love with anything like equal attachment. But the child shrank, like most others of her age, from the quiet dark chamber of illness, and longed to follow her mother through the house, in her tour of observation and renovation. Sarah detected her restlessness and ill-concealed dislike of the confinement imposed upon her by compliance with her humble petition—
"Please, Jeannie, stay a little while with your poor sister!" And her sensitive spirit turned upon itself, as a final stroke of torture, the conviction that here, also, love and care had been wasted.
"Go, then!" she said, rather roughly, as Jeannie wavered, "and you need not come up again to-day. I know it is not pleasant for you to be here. Tell mother I want nothing but quiet."
"I have had a splendid drive!" said Lucy, rustling her many flounces into the door at dusk.
The figure upon the bed made no response by motion or word.
"I do believe she is asleep!" added the intruder, lowering her voice. "I suppose she is tired and needs rest." And she went out on tiptoe.
Sarah was awake a minute later, when her father came in to see her. She smiled at him, as he "hoped she was better," and asked whether she might not get up on the morrow. Mr. Hunt thought not. The doctor's opinion was that perfect repose might ward off the worse features of the disease. She had better keep to her bed for a couple of days yet, even should she feel well enough to be about. He sent up her dinner to her room with his own hands; and when she learned this, she strove to do some feeble justice to the viands, but without success.
Philip dined with the family that day by special appointment; and, shortly after his arrival, Lucy again presented herself in that small third-story bedroom.
"Choose! which hand will you take?" she cried, hiding both behind her.
Sarah would make no selection; and, after a little more trifling, the elder sister brought into sight two elegant bouquets, and laid them beside the invalid.