'I am sorry if I grieve you, Aunt Milly. I wish myself that we had never entered on this subject.'
'I wish it with all my heart, Richard; but I had no idea my own nephew could be so hard.'
'Unhappiness and want of sympathy make a man hard, Aunt Milly. But, all the same,' speaking with manifest effort, 'I am making a bad return for your kindness.'
'I wish you would let me be kind,' she returned, earnestly. 'Nay, my dear boy,' as an impatient frown crossed his face, 'I am not going to renew a vexed subject. I love Olive too well to have her unjustly censured, and you are too prejudiced and blinded by your own troubles to be capable of doing her justice. I only want'—here Mildred paused and faltered—'remember the bruised reed, Richard, and the mercy promised to the merciful. When we come to our last hour, Cardie, and our poor little life-torch is about to be extinguished, I think we shall be thankful if no greater sins are written up against us than want of tact and the error of judgment that comes from over-conscientiousness and a too great love;' and without looking at his face, or trusting herself to say more, Mildred turned to the breakfast-table, where he shortly afterwards joined her.
Olive was in such a suffering condition all the morning that she needed her aunt's tenderest attention, and Mildred did not see her brother till later in the day.
The reaction caused by 'the Royal magnanimity,' as Mildred phrased it to Dr. Heriot afterwards, had passed into subsequent depression as the hours passed on, and no message reached her from the brother she loved but too well. Mildred feigned for a long time not to notice the weary, wistful looks that followed her about the room, especially as she knew Olive's timidity would not venture on direct questioning, but the sight of tears stealing from under the closed lids caused her to relent. Roy's prescription of quicksilver had wholly failed. Polly, saddened and mystified by the sorrowful spectacle of three-piled woe, forgot all her saucy speeches, and blundered over her sympathising ones. And Chrissy was even worse; she clattered about the room in her thick boots, and talked loudly in the crossest possible key about people being stupid enough to have feelings and make themselves ill about nothing. Chriss soon got her dismissal, but as Mildred returned a little flushed from the summary ejectment which Chriss had playfully tried to dispute, she stooped over the bed and whispered—
'Never mind, dear, it could not be helped; has it made your head worse?'
'Only a little. Chriss is always so noisy.'
'Shall we have Polly back? she is quieter and more accustomed to sickrooms.'
'No, thank you; I like being alone with you best, Aunt Milly, only—' here a large tear dropped on the coverlid.