"She is not going to die."
And now he said it again, cheerfully, to the wasted figure in the bed. "I have come to make you well, Beulah."
But Beulah was not at all sure that she wanted to be—well. She was too tired. She was tired of Eric, tired of her mother, tired of taking medicine, tired of having to breathe.
So she shut her eyes and turned away.
Eric sat by the bed. "Dear heart," he said, "it is Dr. Dicky."
But she did not open her eyes.
In the days that followed Richard fought to make his words come true. He felt that if Beulah died it would, in some way, be his fault. He was aware that this was a morbid state of mind, but he could not help the way he felt. Beulah's life would be the price of his self-respect.
But it was not only for Beulah's life that he fought, but for the lives of others. He had nurses up from Baltimore and down from New York. He had experts to examine wells and springs and other sources of water supply. He had a motor car that he might cover the miles quickly, using old Ben only for short distances. Toby, adapting himself to the car, sat on the front seat with the wind in his face, drunk with the excitement of it.
When Nancy spoke of the expense to which Richard was putting himself, he said, "I have saved something, mother, and Eric and the rest can pay."
Surely in those days St. Michael needed his sword, for the fight was to the finish. Night and day the battle waged. Richard went from bedside to bedside, coming always last to Beulah in the shadowed pink and white room at the Playhouse.