Mrs. Ogden gave a stifled cry and sank back in her chair.
"Oh! my head, it's swimming, I feel sinking, I feel as if I were dying. Oh! oh! my head!"
"Sit up!" commanded Joan. "You're not dying, but I think Milly is."
Mrs. Ogden began to cry weakly as Joan turned away. "Cruel, cruel!" she murmured.
Joan went up to her and shook her slightly. "Behave yourself, Mother; I've no time for this sort of thing."
"To tell me that a child of mine is dying! You say that to frighten me; I shall tell the doctor."
Joan shrugged her shoulders. "You may tell him what you please. I'm going up to Milly, now."
3
Richard had been gone for some weeks and Mr. and Mrs. Benson had moved back to London when Milly came home. Joan would have given much to have had Richard to talk to just now, but she could only write and tell him her fears, which his brief answers did little to dispel. He advised an immediate consultation and mentioned a first-class specialist; at the same time he managed to drop a word here and there anent Joan's own prospects, which he pointed out were becoming more gloomy with every month of delay. No, Richard was not in a consoling mood these days.
Lawrence, on the other had, was full of kindness. He had taken to coming down to Conway House for the weekends, and he seldom came without a jar of turtle soup or some other expensive luxury for the invalid. His constant visits to Leaside might have suggested an interest in one of its inmates; in fact Mrs. Ogden began to wonder whether Lawrence was falling out of love with Elizabeth and into love with Milly. But Joan was not deceived; she felt certain that he only came there in the hopes of catching a glimpse of Elizabeth if, as sometimes happened, he found her out when he called at her brother's house; she was amused and yet vaguely annoyed.