“You will come back?”
“When I am cured.”
There was a long silence. At last Gethryn put a thin hand on Braith’s shoulder and looked him lovingly in the face.
“You know, and I know, how little I have ever done to deserve your goodness, to show my gratitude and—and love for you. But if I ever come back I will prove to you—”
Braith could not answer, and did not try to. He sat and looked at the floor, the sad lines about his mouth deeply marked, his throat moving once or twice as he swallowed the lump of grief that kept rising.
After a while he muttered something about its being time for Rex’s supper and got up and fussed about with a spirit lamp and broths and jellies, more like Rex’s mother than a rough young bachelor. In the midst of his work there came a shower of blows on the studio door and Clifford, Rowden and Elliott trooped in without more ado.
They set up a chorus of delighted yells at seeing Rex dressed and on the studio lounge. But Braith suppressed them promptly.
“Don’t you know any better than that?” he growled. “What did you come for, anyway? It’s Rex’s supper time.”
“We came, Papa,” said Clifford, “to tell Rex that I have reformed. We wanted him to know it as soon as we did ourselves.”
“Ah! he’s a changed man! He’s worked all day at Julien’s for a week past,” cried Elliott and Rowden together.