Here before her stood certainly the very handsomest man she had ever seen—tall, elegant, fascinating—and she was certainly expecting something like this to happen—or, at least, hoping it.
But her great dreamy, dark eyes suddenly dilated from wonder to surprise and horror, her cheeks blanched, her lips parted with a gasping cry:
“What is this? Have I lost my senses? Is it you, Doctor Ludington? How dare you?”
She sat up in bed, huddling the covers about her with one hand, the other pointed at him in dismay.
Doctor Ludington stood still, with his hand on the back of the chair, and answered gravely:
“Are you not ill, Miss Somerville? Then why did you send for me?”
“I send for you, sir? Never, never! I am not ill! If I were, I would die before I sent for you, the son of gran’ther’s enemy! Go, go, at once!” cried Eva, with bitter scorn.
But he stood still, replying gravely:
“Hear me, Miss Somerville, before you banish me in scorn! We have fallen into the snare of some practical joker, who sent for me to come here, saying that you were ill, dying—ah,” and his eyes fell on the table bespread with dainty viands, and he smiled in the face of her scorn. “I understand now,” he added. “You spread your table for a phantom lover, and some jester sent me to personate him. Ah, Miss Somerville—Eva—what a happy chance! Am I pardoned for coming, believing you were ill and needed me? Will you permit me to sup with you, indeed, since I am really quite famished, having been far into the country without food since breakfast, on my rounds to the sick?”
Still half dazed, Eva motioned him to eat, and with a grateful smile he drew up his chair to the feast, saying gently: