My mistress followed me out of the room.
"Can you ever forgive me, ma'am?" I said.
"I do forgive you, Peter," she answered, "for I know how sorry you are. And I think—I hope—it would not have made much difference if the doctor had been here before, for he says that I had done all that could have been done before he came."
Then I handed her the telegram, and tears came in her eyes as she read it, for I had told her about Salome, and she knew how much I loved her.
"Trouble everywhere, Peter," she said. "Yes, you may go, and you may stay a few days if you can be of any use."
I thanked her very much, and she crept into the room again.
We did not go to bed for a long time after that. We sat round the kitchen fire, and Bagot stepped over to the house every half-hour to ask in the kitchen how the child was; and it was not until he brought us word that Master Reggie was asleep, and that the doctor said all danger was over for the present, and that he was preparing to go home, that we could make up our minds to go upstairs.
I had a very short night, for the train started at eight o'clock, and I had to walk to the station.
When I arrived at home, I went at once upstairs to Salome's room, and I found my mother, looking very worn and tired, watching beside her. Salome seemed to be quite unconscious; she did not know me when I went in, though my mother said she had called for me many times in the night. She was talking wildly and strangely, and I thought she looked very ill indeed. My mother said she did not know what was the matter with her; she had been ill now for some days, and every day she grew worse.
The doctor came soon after I arrived, and my mother went downstairs with him, and left me with Salome. When she came back, she said—