“It will cause a great commotion in this quiet town and give them something to gossip about for a month,” she said, “and I can almost hear Mr. Taylor’s ‘I’ll be dumbed,’ when it comes to his ears.”
She laughed when she thought of that, and burying her face in her pillow tried, by counting a hundred backwards and every other device she had ever heard of, to sleep, but in vain, and morning found her just as wakeful as she had been when she first sought her bed.
CHAPTER XXI.
THE DENOUEMENT.
It was not a feigned headache of which she complained when she went down to breakfast. Her temples were throbbing with pain and there were dark circles around her eyes.
“Mother,” she said, “I am going to New York on the noon train to see Dr. Allen. I believe I am malarious, I am having so much headache and feel so languid. Charlotte, you know, is in our house. I can stay there to-night and come back to-morrow.”
Mrs. Tracy was at once concerned and anxious and unwilling to have her go alone, or to have her go at all.
“Why not consult some physician in town?”
“Yes, and have tons of quinine prescribed, with a little morphine, perhaps, to make me sleep!” Helen answered impatiently. “No country quacks for me. I want my good old Dr. Allen or nobody.”
“Then I shall go with you, and for that matter we might as well pack up and leave altogether. I am quite ready,” Mrs. Tracy said.
Here was a dilemma which Helen had anticipated and which she met promptly.