She shook her head.
"It's a case of tuberculous lung-disease. He developed it in the Clergy House at St. Margaret's, and made light of it, supposing or pretending that the cough and wasting and difficulty of breathing meant bronchial trouble, the result of London fogs. These young people who don't value Life—glorious gift that it is! When he broke down utterly, at the end of a rampant campaign against Intemperance—he wouldn't be the Bishop's son if he didn't gall the withers of some hobby-horse or other—the doctors agreed there was nothing for him but South Africa."
He frowned, knowing how many sufferers had died of that deadly prescription. She went on:
"So he came out—alone—upon the advice of the well-intentioned wiseacres, knowing nothing of the country, to live on his two hundred a year until the end. And the end is coming—in Gueldersdorp Hospital—with giant strides." She blinked. "They've isolated him in a small detached ward. He has a kind friend in the Matron, and the chart-nurse is in love with him, unless I'm mistaken in the symptoms of the complaint. And he looks like St. Francis of Assisi, wedded to Death instead of Poverty—and coughs—fit to tear your heart. B'rrh!" she shuddered.
He repeated: "I'll see what can be done to-morrow. These cases are deceptive. There may be a gleam of hope."
"There is one doubt about the case which might infer a hope. I don't know what discoveries the London doctors made, but I wormed out of the chart-nurse, who plainly adores him, that the doctors in Gueldersdorp can't scare up a bacillus for the life of them."
His eyes lightened involuntary admiration, though his tone was jesting.
"You're thrown away on mere journalism. Criminal Investigation or Secret Intelligence would offer wider fields for your abilities."
"Wait!" she said, her beady eyes black diamonds. "I shall hope to prove one day that an English woman-journalist can be as useful as a Boer spy in the matter of useful information. Why, why am I not a man? You only don't trust me because I am a woman."
He had touched the rankling point in her ambition. He applied balm as he knew how.