"Until?"
"Until he—dies—or——"
"Or?"
"We can't think of the future; we must just go on from day to day. I know it is much to ask of you, a stranger, but I have no choice but to ask it. Think it over. For a day or two I can keep him quiet, but not for longer. Take a day or two to decide."
"I will think it over. I cannot decide now—indeed, indeed I cannot," said Philippa earnestly. "It is not that my heart is not wrung with pity. It is the most pitiful thing I ever heard of; and if I—a stranger, as you truly say—feel it pitiful, what must it be to you who have known him always?"
Tears were standing in her eyes. Apart from the tragedy there was something very touching in this man's affection and sorrow for his friend. Neither gruffness of tone nor shortness of manner could disguise the strength of the underlying feeling.
"What has his life been?" she asked. "What has he done?"
"Waited," answered the doctor shortly. "Just waited. Nothing more nor less. He has occupied himself a little for a few moments at a time. He has read, but does not remember what he reads, and the same book serves him over and over again. He has painted a little, but always the same thing—a woman's face—sketchy—unfinished, but recognisable; and then thrown aside to commence another—but always the same face. But never for one day in all these years has he forgotten the violets."
"What violets?"
"It was his custom during their short engagement to give her a bunch of violets every morning. They were her favourite flower, and he took a good deal of trouble to procure them, and when, after his accident, the season for their blooming passed, and there were none, it distressed him so terribly that his mother, Lady Louisa, insured that there should be a constant supply for him.