Dr. Enderby looked very grave. “There is no hurry about that,” he said, “let her have a little more time. The Signor must be content to wait.”
Now Lottie had said, and they all had said, that her voice was gone; but when the doctor’s face grew so grave, a cold chill struck to their hearts. She gave him a startled look of alarmed inquiry, she who had suddenly realised, now that all dreams were over, that question of existence which is the primitive question in this world. Before happiness, before love, before everything that makes life lovely, this mere ignoble foundation of a living, must come. When one is young, as Lottie said, one cannot die at one’s own pleasure—and suddenly, just as she had got to realise that necessity, was it possible that this other loss was really coming too? She looked at him with anxious eyes, but he would not look at her, to give her any satisfaction; then she laid her hand softly on his arm.
“Doctor,” she said, “tell me true—tell me the worst there is to tell. Shall I never have my voice again? is it gone, gone?”
“We must not ask such searching questions,” said the doctor, with a smile. “We don’t know anything about never in our profession. We know to-day, and perhaps to-morrow—something about them—but no more.”
He tried to smile, feeling her gaze upon him, and made light of her question. But Lottie was not to be evaded. All the little colour there was ebbed out of her face.
“Shall I never sing again?” she said. “No—that is not what I mean; shall I never be able to sing as I did once? Is it over? Oh, Doctor, tell me the truth, is that over too?”
They were all surrounding him with anxious faces. The doctor got up hurriedly and told them he had an appointment. “Do not try to sing,” he said, “my dear,” patting her on the shoulder. “It will be better for you, for a long time, if you do not even try;” and before anyone could speak again he had escaped, and was hurrying away.
When he was gone, Lottie sat still, half stupefied, yet quivering with pain and the horror of a new discovery. She could not speak at first. She looked round upon them with trembling lips, and great tears in her eyes. Then all at once she slid down upon her knees at Mrs. Temple’s feet.
“Now all is gone,” she said, “all is gone—not even that is left. Take me for your servant instead of the one that is going away. I can work—I am not afraid to work. I know all the work of a house. Let me be your servant instead of the one who is going away.”
“Oh, Lottie, hush, hush! are you not my child?” said Mrs. Temple, with a great outcry of weeping, clasping her shoulders and drawing the upturned face to her breast. But Lottie insisted gently and kept her position. In this thing at least she was not to be balked.