I looked around for our party. They had disappeared up the other aisle under convoy of the bedesman, leaving Helen and myself to follow at our leisure; or perhaps not noticing our absence. Helen, marching away with quick steps, passed out at the grand entrance.
“It is not safe for you to go, Helen,” I remonstrated, as we went round the graveyard and so up High Street. “You would catch the fever from him.”
“I shall catch no fever.”
“He caught it.”
“I wish you’d be quiet. Can’t you see what I am suffering?”
The sweetest sight to me just then would have been Lady Whitney, or any one else holding authority over Helen. I seemed responsible for any ill that might ensue: and yet, what could I do?
“Helen, pray listen to a word of reason! See the position you put me in. A fever is not a light thing to risk.”
“I don’t believe that typhoid fever is catching. He did not say typhus.”
“Of course it’s catching.”
“Are you afraid of it?”