"Won't you let me thank you first?"
"No, thanks never would repay me for all the annoyance you have been. Show your gratitude by obedience, sir—stop talking and go to sleep!"
Perhaps Doctor Frank found it very pleasant to be ordered, for he obeyed with a smile on his face.
Of course, with such a nurse as Miss Danton, the man would be obstinate, indeed, who would not rally. Doctor Frank was the reverse of obdurate, and rallied with astonishing rapidity. His sister, Eeny, and Kate were the most devoted, the most attentive of nurses; but the hours that Captain Danton's eldest daughter sat by his bedside flew like so many minutes. It was very pleasant to lie there, propped up with pillows, with the April sunshine lying in yellow squares on the faded old carpet, and watch that beautiful face, bending over some piece of elaborate embroidery, or the humble dress of some village child. She read for him, too, charming romances, and poetry as sweet as the ripple of a sunlit brook, in that enchanting voice of hers; and Doctor Frank began to think convalescence the most delightful state of being that ever was heard of, and to wish it could last forever.
But, like all the pleasant things of this checkered life, it came to an end all too soon. The day arrived when he sat up in his easy chair by the open window, with the scented breezes blowing in his face, and watched dreamily the cows grazing in the fields, and the dark-eyed French girls tripping up and down the dusty road. Then, a little later, and he could walk about in the tiny garden before the cottage, and sit up the whole day long. He was getting better fast; and Miss Danton, concluding her occupation was gone, became very much like the Miss Danton of old. Not imperious and proud—she never would be that again—but reserved and distant, and altogether changed; the delightful readings were no more, the pleasant tête-à-têtes were among the things of the past, the long hours spent by his side, with some womanly work in her fingers, were over and gone. She was very kind and gentle still, and the smile that always greeted him was very bright and sweet, but that heavenly past was gone forever. Doctor Frank, about as clear-sighted as his sex generally are, of course never guessed within a mile of the truth.
"What a fool I was!" he thought, bitterly, "flattering myself with such insane dreams, because she was grateful to me for saving her sister's life, and pitied me when she thought I was at death's door. Why, she nursed every sick pauper in St. Croix as tenderly as she did me. She is right to put me back in my place before I have made an idiot of myself!"
So the convalescent gentleman became moody, and silent and generally disagreeable; and Grace was the only one who guessed at his feelings and was sorry for him. But he grew well in spite of hidden trouble, and began to think of what he was to do in the future.
"I'll go back to Montreal next week, I think," he said to his sister; "now that the fever has gone, it won't pay to stay here. If I don't get on in Montreal, I'll try New York."
Man proposes, etc. That evening's mail brought him a letter that materially altered all his plans. He sat so long silent and thoughtful after reading it, that Grace looked at him in surprise.
"You look as grave as an owl, Frank. Whom is your letter from?"