“All that’s arranged,” he said, hastily, “Come, we must go back to our patient. She will be wondering what I am talking to you about. She will perhaps take fright. No, nothing easier, my poor child—if you can do that you may help me a great deal; if you can’t, go to bed, my dear, that will be best.”
She gave him a look of great scorn, and moved towards her mother’s room, leading the way.
Mrs. Kingsward was lying with her face towards the door, watching, in a blaze of excitement and fever. Her eyes had never been so bright nor her colour so brilliant. She was breathing quickly, panting, with her heart very audible to herself, pumping in her ears, and almost audible in the room, so evident was it that every pulse was at fever speed. “What have you been telling Bee, doctor? What have you been telling Bee? What——” When she had begun this phrase it did not seem as if she could stop repeating it again and again.
“I have been telling her that she may sit with you, my dear lady, on condition of being very quiet, very quiet,” said the doctor. “It’s a great promotion at her age. She has promised to sit very still, and talk very little, and hush her mamma to sleep. It is you who must be the baby to-night. If you can get a good long quiet sleep, it will do you all the good in the world. Yes, you may hold her hand if you like, my dear, and pat it, and smooth it—a little gentle mesmerism will do no harm. That, my dear lady, is what I have been telling Miss Bee.”
“Oh, doctor,” said Mrs. Kingsward, “don’t you know she has had great trouble herself, poor child? Poor little Bee! At her age I was married and happy; and here is she, poor thing, plunged into trouble. Doctor, you know, there is a—gentleman——”
Mrs. Kingsward had raised herself upon her elbow, and the panting of her breath filled all the room.
“Another time—another time you shall tell me all about it. But I shall take Miss Bee away, and consign you to a dark room, and silence, if you say another word——”
“Oh, don’t make my room dark! I like the light. I want my child. Let me keep her, let me keep her! Who should—comfort her—but her mother?”
“Yes, so long as you keep quiet. If you talk I will take her away. Not a word—not a word—till to-morrow.” In spite of himself there was a change in the doctor’s voice as he said that word—or Bee thought so—as if there might never be any to-morrow. The girl felt as if she must cry out, shriek aloud, to relieve her bursting brain, but did not, overborne by his presence and by the new sense of duty and self-restraint. “Come now,” he went on, “I am very kind to let you have your little girl by you, holding your hand—don’t you think so? Go to sleep, both of you. If you’re quite, quite, quiet you’ll both doze, and towards the morning I’ll look in upon you again. Now, not another word. Good-night, good-night.”
Bee, whose heart was beating almost as strongly as her mother’s, heard his measured step withdraw on the soft carpets with a sense of wild despair, as if the last hope was going from her. Her inexperienced imagination had leaped from complete ignorance and calm to the last possibilities of calamity. She had never seen death, and what if that awful presence were to come while she was alone, incapable of any struggle, of giving any help. She listened to the steps getting fainter in the distance with anguish and terror unspeakable. She clasped her mother’s hand tightly without knowing it. That only aid, the only man who could do anything, was going away—deserting them—leaving her alone in her ignorance to stand between her mother and death. Death! Every pulse sprang up and fluttered in mortal terror. And she was put there to be quiet—ready and steady, he had said—to look happy! Bee kept silent; kept sitting upon her chair; kept down her shriek after him with a superhuman effort. She could do no more.