She shook her head and managed to say “Catch.”
Still Jack had no idea of what she meant, but he put the two words together and asked: “Don’t catch what?”
“Ma—an,” she gasped with a tremendous effort, and there came a horrible suspicion across Jack’s mind.
It could not be possible either, he thought, though if it were true it would account for the terrible shock to Georgie.
“Did you think you knew the man?” he asked; and Georgie nodded her head, while the tears gathered in her eyes and rolled down her cheeks.
Jack asked her no more questions then. He hoped and believed she was mistaken; but when later in the day the men who had gone in pursuit came back reporting their ill success, he managed adroitly to cool their ardor a little, and threw what obstacles he could in the way of their continuing the search. He was to write a notice for the papers, but he conveniently forgot it, and put it off until the following day, and Georgie’s face looked brighter when he told her what he was doing. She had not seen Roy yet, though he had been in the house all the time, now sitting with Mrs. Burton, who had taken to her bed, and was more troublesome than Georgie, and now walking slowly up and down the piazza, with his head bent forward and his hands clasped together behind his back. Of what he was thinking, all guessed, but none knew how full of remorse he was when he remembered the previous night when he had shrunk so from his fate, and half wished that something might arise to save him from it. Something had arisen, a terrible something, and to himself he said, as he walked up and down, “I did not want this to happen; did not want Georgie harmed, and if I could, how gladly I would save her.”
His heart was very full of pity and tenderness, and almost love, for the poor girl, who never forgot him for a moment, and who felt comforted in knowing that it was his step she heard so constantly passing beneath her window. She had intervals when speech was easier, and in one of these, which came toward the sun-setting, she beckoned to Jack, who was at her side in an instant, trying to comprehend her meaning.
“Roy,” she said, then paused a moment, and added, “Free—free;—tell him—now.”
Jack understood her, but did not go at once.
“Wait awhile before doing that,” he said. “You may get entirely well; the doctor says so.”