"I was looking outside," was Henry's evasive reply. "They had Dr. Ware to me this morning; did you know it?"
"I am glad of that!" exclaimed Mr. St. John. "What does he say?"
"I did not hear him say much. He asked me where my head was struck when I fell, but I could not tell him—I did not know at the time, you remember. He and Mr.——"
Henry's voice faltered. A sudden, almost imperceptible, movement of the head nearer the window, and a wild accession of colour to his feverish cheek, betrayed to Mr. St. John that something was passing which bore for him a deep interest. He raised his own head and caught a sufficient glimpse: Georgina Beauclerc.
It told Mr. St. John all: though he had not needed to be told; and Miss Beauclerc's mysterious words, and Henry's past conduct became clear to him. So! the boy's heart had been thus early awakened—and crushed.
"The heart that is soonest awake to the flowers
Is always the first to be touched by the thorns,"
whistled Mr. St. John to himself.
Ay, crushing is as sure to follow that early awaking, as that thorns grow on certain rose-trees. But Mr. St. John said nothing more that day.
On the following day, upon going in, he found Henry in bed.
"Like a sensible man as you are," quoth Mr. St. John, by way of salutation. "Now don't rise from it again until you are better."