“Sibella!” It was Von Blon’s voice that, like the lash of a whip, cut in on this unreasoned tirade. “That will be enough!” He moved forward, and glanced menacingly into the girl’s eyes. I was almost as astonished at his attitude as I had been at her wild words. There was a curious intimacy in his manner—an implication of familiarity which struck me as unusual even for a family physician of his long and friendly standing. Vance noticed it too, for his eyebrows went up slightly and he watched the scene with intense interest.
“You’ve become hysterical,” Von Blon said, without lowering his minatory gaze. “You don’t realize what you’ve been saying.”
I felt he would have expressed himself far more forcibly if strangers had not been present. But his words had their effect. Sibella dropped her eyes, and a sudden change came over her. She covered her face with her hands, and her whole body shook with sobs.
“I’m—sorry. I was mad—and silly—to say such things.”
“You’d better take Sibella to her room, Chester.” Von Blon had resumed his professional tone. “This business has been too much for her.”
The girl turned without another word and went out, followed by Chester.
“These modern women—all nerves,” Von Blon commented laconically. Then he placed his hand on Ada’s forehead. “Now, young lady, I’m going to give you something to make you sleep after all this excitement.”
He had scarcely opened his medicine-case to prepare the draught when a shrill, complaining voice drifted clearly to us from the next room; and for the first time I noticed that the door of the little dressing-room which communicated with Mrs. Greene’s quarters was slightly ajar.
“What’s all the trouble now? Hasn’t there been enough disturbance already without these noisy scenes in my very ear? But it doesn’t matter, of course, how much I suffer. . . . Nurse! Shut those doors into Ada’s room. You had no business to leave them open when you knew I was trying to get a little rest. You did it on purpose to annoy me. . . . And nurse! Tell the doctor I must see him before he goes. I have those stabbing pains in my spine again. But who thinks about me, lying here paralyzed——?”
The doors were closed softly, and the fretful voice was cut off from us.