Captain Sparks, private secretary, stood for a moment with his legs apart in blank astonishment, while Mrs. Church sought among the folds of her skirt for her pocket-handkerchief.
“By the Lord—impossible!” he burst out; and then, as Judith pointed mutely to her husband’s room, he turned and shot in that direction, leaving her, as her sex is usually left, with the teacups and the situation.
A few hours later Captain Sparks’ dreams of the changed condition of things were interrupted by a knock. It was Mrs. Church, sleepy-eyed, in her dressing-gown, with a candle; and she wanted the chlorodyne from the little travelling medicine chest, which was among the private secretary’s things.
“My husband seems to have got a chill,” she said. “It must have been while he sat in the verandah. I am afraid he is in for a wretched night.”
“Three fingers of brandy,” suggested Sparks concernedly, getting out the bottle. “Nothing like brandy.”
“He has tried brandy. About twenty drops of this, I suppose?”
“I should think so. Can I be of any use?”
Judith said No, thanks—she hoped her husband would get some sleep presently. She went away, shielding her flickering candle, and darkness and silence came again where she had been.
A quarter of an hour later she came back, and it appeared that Captain Sparks could be of use. The chill seemed obstinate; they must rouse the servants and get fires made and water heated. Judith wanted to know how soon one might repeat the dose of chlorodyne. She was very much awake, and had that serious, pale decision with which women take action in emergencies of sickness.