"I told you before, David; you're going to be terribly disappointed, if you think she's coming."
"I would have undertaken to bring her!" he cried. "We can trust George. And I don't suppose he'll even say where he's taking her."
"If she doesn't know where she's coming," I interrupted, "you'd better keep out of the way till she says she'd like to see you."
"I must welcome her," O'Rane answered.
Bertrand and I exchanged glances and excused ourselves. As we turned at the door, O'Rane was standing with his watch to his ear. About three-quarters of an hour later I heard a car slowing down in the street outside.
George has told me since that his cousin and he found their patient far less difficult than they had feared. She was plunged in melancholy bordering on hysteria. Loneliness, pain and neglect had reduced her pride until she sat up in bed with her face contorted and tears trickling down her cheeks, reproaching them for never coming to see her and bitterly proclaiming that she now knew how much trust to put in people when they said that they were her friends. George took her hand and explained that he had come to take her away where she would be tended and made happy. At once there was an indignant outburst; she would not move, she was quite well; if they would go away instead of bullying her, worrying her, threatening her, she would be all right in a moment. He let the storm spend itself and recaptured the hand that she had snatched away.
"Violet's told me what's the matter with you," he whispered. "Unless you're very quiet and good, you'll injure yourself. And you are going to be quiet and good, aren't you?" He was talking to her as though she were a child and she responded by throwing her arms round his neck and weeping convulsively. "You're going to be very good, aren't you, Sonia? And we're all going to take the greatest care of you. Violet's got her car here, and we're going to wrap you in a cloak and explain to your landlady that we're not really stealing the blankets, however much appearances may be against us, and we're going to take you away, and you're going to be in the midst of friends, and everybody's going to be kind and sweet to you, and you're going to forget how lonely and miserable you've been the last few days."
He lifted her into a sitting position, while Lady Loring hunted for slippers and wrapped a cloak about her.
"I don't deserve it!" Mrs. O'Rane cried with sudden revulsion. "Why do you come here bothering me? It's my fault, I knew perfectly well what I was doing; I should never have done it, if he'd treated me properly, if he'd loved me. It was David's fault, you know it was; and you come here bothering me when I'm ill...."
George helped her out of bed and supported her across the room. From time to time she muttered, "Why don't you leave me alone? It was his fault, but he could never do any wrong in your eyes!" like a sobbing child in the last stages of a tornado of temper. He carried her into the car, while Lady Loring poured out a hurried explanation to the landlady. A deep drowsiness descended upon her as she felt herself being packed into a bed of cushions, while a bearskin rug was wrapped round her, but, as the engine started, she opened her eyes and enquired sleepily where she was being taken.