Nigel had been sent over to Dormans the first thing in the morning, to buy up all the papers he could. Several of them had a report of von Gleichroeder's concert, and most of these mentioned Nigel's performance favourably.
"Mr. Furlonger has undoubtedly a great deal to learn on the mechanical side of his art, but he has a wonderful force of temperament, which last night compensated in many ways for faulty technique. He even managed to work some emotional beauty into Scriabin's bundle of tricks, and one can imagine that in music which depended on the beautiful instead of on the bizarre for its appeal, he would have the chance, which was denied him last night, of a really fine performance. We do not say that Mr. Furlonger will ever be a master, but if he will avoid fashionable gymnastics and not despise such out-of-date considerations as beauty and harmony, he may become a temperamental violinist of the first order." All the critics, more or less, had a hit at the "advanced" type of music, and Nigel imagined von Gleichroeder's wrath.
Len insisted on having all the criticisms read to him, and a thrill of pride went through even Janey's numb breast. She had never tried to speak to Nigel alone, and he gave her no hint that he knew she was in trouble. But when his heart was not bursting with anxiety for Len, it brimmed with compassion for Janey. She might have been nursing her brother for weeks instead of hours to judge by her haggard face, white lips, and faded eyes. Her movements were listless, and her figure in rest had the droop of utter exhaustion.
She and Nigel divided the nursing between them. Len was never left alone. He had to be fed every two hours, and it generally took both of them to do it, as he was very perverse in the matter of meals, saying that the food choked him. In the afternoon he became a little delirious. He seemed to be trying to ask for things, and yet to be unable to say what he really meant, often saying something quite different. He was intensely pathetic in his weakness. This dulling, or rather disturbance, of his faculties seemed to distress him far more than his difficult breathing or the pain in his side. Now and then he would hold out his hands piteously to Nigel and Janey, and would lie for some time holding the hand of each, his brown eyes staring at them imploringly, as if they were fighting for the powers of speech which the tongue had lost—in the way that the eyes of animals often fight.
They tried to make him go to sleep, but he was always restless and awake. They read to him, talked to him and to each other, with no success. Outside, the day was dull, yet warm and steamy. Every now and then a shower would rustle noisily on the leaves, and after it passed there would be many drippings.
Nigel went out for an hour or two's work on the farm when evening fell. It seemed extraordinary that only some eighteen hours lay between him and the concert at the Bechstein Hall. That part of his life had been put aside—not for ever, perhaps, but none the less temporarily banished by a usurping present. Some day, no doubt, he would put on the last six months again, just as he would put on the dress clothes he had folded away, but now he wore corduroys and the last eighteen hours.
At six the doctor called again. He shook his head at the sight of Leonard.
"He must have a nurse," he said.
"Oh, no ... for heaven's sake!" groaned Len.
"Nigel and I can nurse him," said Janey.