“No; I think he’d like it better if you went alone. He has seen no one but Leila, the doctor and me; he’s probably anxious to see a new face. I’ll telephone you’re coming.”
As Bruce entered Mills’s room a white-frocked nurse quietly withdrew. The maid who had shown him up drew a chair beside the bed and left them. He was alone with Mills, trying to adjust himself to the change in him, the pallor of the face against the pillow, the thin cheeks, the hair white now where it had only been touched with gray.
“This is very kind of you! I’m poor company; but I hoped you wouldn’t mind running out.”
“I thought you were away. Carroll just told me you were here.”
“No; I’ve been here sometime—so long, in fact, that I feel quite out of the world.”
“Mrs. Thomas is at home—I’ve seen her several times.”
“Yes, Leila’s very good to me; runs out every day or two. She’s full of importance over having her own establishment.”
Bruce spoke of his own affairs; told of the progress that had been made with the Laconia memorial before the weather became unfavorable. The foundations were in and the materials were being prepared; the work would go forward rapidly with the coming of spring.
“I can appreciate your feeling about it—your own idea taking form. I’ve thought of it a good deal. Indeed, I’ve thought of you a great deal since I’ve been here.”
“If I’d known you were here and cared to see me I should have come out,” said Bruce quite honestly.