David started in evident astonishment.
“Miss Daphne Dalrymple!”
“Yes; Miss Daphne Dalrymple, Dibble & Dribble’s typewriter. We used to be great friends; but, since the Dalrymples failed, she has dropped out of sight of her old friends, and is quite distant. But I love her dearly all the same, and I hope you will persuade her to come and see me. Now do. Good-bye! I expect Mr. Pilaster is angry clear through by this time.”
Mr. Dewness led her back, and thanked her earnestly, wished Mr. Pilaster a jolly time, and went off rapidly in the direction of Dibble & Dribble’s, while May proceeded to restore Mr. Pilaster’s spirits by explaining with a simulated sigh:
“Well, there! that is probably the last I shall see of Mr. Dewness. He’s gone mad for a pretty girl, and I’ve been sending him straight to her. Mr. Pilaster, I’m too good. Here I go, like a fool, and send away a good friend, merely because he thinks he’ll be happier with another. But a girl is alway foolish to permit a man to be her friend; he is sure to desert a mere friend to run after the first pretty face that catches his fancy.”
Mr. Pilaster warmly defended his sex, and especially himself as one who would never prove a deserter, with such appearances of success as fully restored his pride, and filled his artful enchantress with almost irrepressible chuckles.
Dibble & Dribble received Mr. Dewness’s inquiries with cold civility. Miss Dalrymple was ill they believed, had been absent from her desk more than a fortnight. Perhaps the errand-boy could give him her street and number. The errand-boy, being called, did so with an evident interest in Miss Dalrymple. He said that Dr. Pulse’s office was right on the way, and perhaps Mr. Dewness had better see him before calling. Mr. Dewness did so, and the doctor accompanied him to the house.
Mrs. Dalrymple at the door reported her daughter better. She was sitting up in a rocking-chair with a shawl about her. The moment they entered the room her eyes were fixed upon Dewness, and her thin face lit up with a smile of pleased welcome. She paid no attention to the doctor, and did not wait for David to be presented, but offered her wasted hand eagerly to the young man, as to a well-known friend, and said, with a sick woman’s child-like trustfulness:
“You have come! I knew you would! Did you bring the wheel?”
David took her hand with a grasp of warm friendliness, and a look of gentle and kind sympathy, as he answered: