She never changed the coldness of her tone.
“No,” she said. “She is going to get well.”
“Confound it!” I growled, under my breath. “How do you know?”
“The blue wall,” she answered with a sneer.
“Bah!” said I, starting up the stairs. “We shall see.”
As I pushed open the door, I observed that the nurse had procured a red silk shade to screen the single electric lamp on the table. The yellow rays were changed to a pink, reflected on the wall, sending their rosy lights into the depths of that bottomless blue; the breaking of a clear day after a spring rain has no softer mingling of colors. For a moment I looked at the chart, then with new hope turned toward Virginia herself.
Either the new tints diffused by the lamp deceived the eye, or the little girl’s pale skin had in fact been warmed by a new response from the springs of life. She was sleeping quietly, her innocent face turned a little toward me and in the faint, illusive smile at her mouth, and in the relaxation of her beautiful hands, I read the confirmation of Miss Peters’s prophecy. I, too, believed just then that Virginia would not die, and that, as so rarely happens in this disease, her recovery would be complete.
“It is a wild night,” said the bony nurse when I had tiptoed out of the room.
She seemed to be wishing to draw from me an opinion on the extraordinary rally the child had made. That was her way; she always invited discussion of a subject by comments about something wholly irrelevant.
“We shall see,” I answered again. “A relapse might be fatal. To-morrow—we shall see.”