“They will be happier without us. We will leave them to have their talk alone,” whispered the elders to each other, as they left the room; but the two girls were mutually suffering from a sense of embarrassment which made conversation difficult to begin.
“How thin she is! Her nose is sharper than ever. Poor dear, she is plain!” reflected Dreda, candid and clear-sighted.
“How thin she is! All her colour has gone, but she looks pretty still. She always does look pretty,” reflected Norah in her turn. She lifted her cup in a trembling hand, looking wistfully at her companion with gaunt, spectacled eyes.
“I am so sorry you were ill... It was all my fault. I kept you there in the cold... Doctor Reed says I should have been plucky and made up my mind to bear the pain ... It’s easy to talk when your bones are whole. When they are broken and sticking into your flesh you feel quite different. It seemed easier to die than to move, but it was hard lines on you... I’m sorry you were ill.”
Dreda beamed reassurement, thoroughly enjoying the position of receiving apologies.
“My dear, don’t mention it. I have suffered too, and I quite understand. Pneumonia’s hateful! I never could have imagined that it was possible to feel so ill. I couldn’t have thought of anyone in the world, but just how to draw the next breath.—It is so nice to feel well again; but I’m dreadfully sympathetic about your knee. When you were lying with your head on my knee that afternoon, I was sorry I’d been so disagreeable at school. You feel such remorse when you’ve snapped at people, and then see them all white and still, with their eyes turned up.—I thought such lots of thoughts that afternoon, and I’m going to be quite different at school. Much nicer—you see if I’m not!”
Nora shook her head, and her eyes sank in painful discomfiture.
“No! I shan’t see. I shan’t be there. The doctor says I shall not be fit for school. I shall never go back to West End. Perhaps it’s just as well. The girls never liked me very much, and now it would be worse than ever—and Miss Drake—Miss Drake would be furious! ... I never meant to tell, but I’ve been miserable ever since, and now I’ve broken my knee—and, when I lay awake crying with pain those first awful nights I made up my mind to tell, whether it was found out or not. It’s awful to have a pain in your body and in your mind as well. Did you guess it was me, Dreda?”
“You—what?” queried Dreda vacantly. Then the colour rushed into her face, and half a dozen questions tripped together on her tongue. “Oh–h, was it you who hid my things? All the things I lost? My pencils, my books, my gloves, the clock that I heard ticking in my hat-box, my slippers that were on the top of the wardrobe? Oh, Norah, why? What made you do it? Was it for fun?”
Norah shook her head.