"Yes, Nature; and she'll go her own way in spite of all the systems that ever were. Don't you know—-you are a teacher, so you ought to know—that overstrain of the higher faculties is sometimes followed by astonishing demonstrations on the part of Nature?"
Miss Quincey replied that no cases of the kind had come under her notice.
"Well—your profession ought to go hand-in-hand with mine. If you only saw the half of what we see—But you only see the process; we get the results. By the way I must go and look at some of them."
His words echoed madly in a feverish little brain, "Ought to go—hand-in-hand—hand-in-hand with mine."
"Nature can be very cruel," said she.
Something in her tone recalled him from his flight. He stood looking down at her, thoughtful and pitiful. "And Nature can be very kind; kinder than we are. You are a case in point. Nature is trying to make you well against your will. A little more rest—a little more exercise—a little more air—"
She smiled. Yes, a little more of all the things she wanted and had never had. That was what her smile said in its soft and deprecating bitterness.
He held out his hand, and she too rose, shivering a little in her thin dress.
She was the first to hurry away.
He looked after her small figure, noted her nervous gait and the agitated movement of her hand as the streamers on her poor cape flapped and fluttered, the sport of the unfeeling wind.