Chapter Fifteen.
Like a Fairy Tale.
“No,” said the doctor; “he’s not gaining ground as he should. Still there’s nothing really wrong. But I hardly know what to advise. What he really should have, as I’ve told you before, is a complete change. Can you not manage it? Not even to Devonshire or the Isle of Wight?”
Mrs Waldron shook her head sadly.
“I think even one of those would be about as impossible for us as the South of France or Italy,” she said. “But I will tell my husband what you say. Of course, in a case of life or death—”
“But it is not so bad as that; I have never said it was,” interrupted the doctor. “Don’t exaggerate it, my dear lady. If you can’t do as I say, you can’t, and we must do what we can, and hope the best. He will outgrow his present weakness I have no doubt. But he has come through so much that I was beginning to be rather proud of him, and this unfortunate back-cast is rather disappointing. I had set my heart on his growing up really strong and hearty, and I quite believe he might if he could get a thorough good start. That is the real state of the case.”
“Thank you! Yes, I think I quite understand,” replied Mrs Waldron. But she sighed as she spoke; and the doctor felt sorry for her, but he had to hurry away; and after all he came across people in worse plight than the Waldrons every day of the week, and he could not afford to spend much time or thought in sympathy.
The plight was bad enough, nevertheless, it seemed to Mrs Waldron, as she went back to the drawing-room where Jerry was lying covered with shawls and sheltered as well as could be from the draughts and insidious chills that it is so difficult entirely to defy in a small house, where one seems always running against a door or a window. The boy, to her eyes sharpened by anxiety, was doing worse than not gaining ground. He was, she began to believe, losing it. And some bitter enough tears rose to her eyes as she sat down to go on with the work at which Dr Lewis’s visit had interrupted her.
“Mamma,” said Jerry’s thin weak voice, “don’t you think Charlotte is really very pleased to have got the German prize?”
“Yes, my boy; I think she is. And she deserves to be so—she worked very hard indeed for it.”