“No!” Evie winced at that, and turning towards the other side of the bed, held out her hand appealingly towards the Nurse, who took it in her own, and frowned a warning to the visitor.
“You had better go now, Miss. She isn’t equal to much yet. You have got your way and seen her, so just give her a kiss, and go quietly away.”
Tears of disappointment rushed to Rhoda’s eyes, and as she stooped to give that farewell kiss the salt drops fell upon Evie’s cheeks, and roused her momentarily from her lethargy.
“Poor Rhoda!” she sighed softly. “Poor little Rhoda!” then her eyes closed, and Nurse took hold of the girl’s arm and led her resolutely away.
“You look as if you were going to faint yourself, and I can’t have two of you on my hands,” she said as soon as the corridor was reached, and the door closed behind them. “You’ll just come back to your own room, my dear, and lie down on the bed.”
“Nurse—tell me! you have been with her the whole time, and know how she feels. Will she ever forgive me? I never, never thought it would be so bad as this. She would not speak to me, would not look at me even.”
“She wasn’t thinking of you at all, my dear, she was thinking of her knee. That is all she can find time to think of just now. The doctors kept it from her as long as they could, but she questioned them, and would not be put off, so they had to tell her the truth. She knows she will be lame, and it has pretty well broken her heart. It’s the bread out of her mouth, poor lamb, and she knows it. It will be many a long day before she is herself again.”
And this was the end of Rhoda’s first meeting with Laura Everett after her accident!