He took both her hands in his, slipping the bracelet on to her attenuated wrist,--and quietly held them. The poor wan face and the hectic colour his presence had called up, had all his attention just then.
"I saw you in the Champs Elysées yesterday, Lucy. It pained me very much to see you so much changed."
"Did you see me? I was there with mamma. It is the fever I had in the summer that hangs about me and does not let me yet get strong."
"Is it nothing else, Lucy?"
The hectic deepened to crimson. The soft brown eyes drooped beneath the gaze of his.
"I fancied there might be another cause for it, Lucy, and I have ventured to say so to Colonel Cleeve. He agrees with me."
"You--you were not afraid to call here!" she exclaimed, as if the fact were a subject of wonder.
"What I had to say to Colonel Cleeve I wrote by letter. After that, he invited me to call."
Karl sat down on the red sofa opposite the chair, and put Lucy by him, his arm entwining her waist. "I want you," he said, "to tell me exactly what it is that keeps you from getting strong, Lucy."
"But I cannot tell you, for I don't know," she answered with a little sob. "I wish I could get well, Karl--for poor papa and mamma's sake."