“I insist on seeing her.”
“Miss Emily, I am disappointing you for your own good. Don’t you know me well enough to trust me by this time?”
“I do trust you.”
“Then leave my mistress to me—and go and make yourself comfortable in your own room.”
Emily’s answer was a positive refusal. Mrs. Ellmother, driven to her last resources, raised a new obstacle.
“It’s not to be done, I tell you! How can you see Miss Letitia when she can’t bear the light in her room? Do you know what color her eyes are? Red, poor soul—red as a boiled lobster.”
With every word the woman uttered, Emily’s perplexity and distress increased.
“You told me my aunt’s illness was fever,” she said—“and now you speak of some complaint in her eyes. Stand out of the way, if you please, and let me go to her.”
Mrs. Ellmother, still keeping her place, looked through the open door.
“Here’s the doctor,” she announced. “It seems I can’t satisfy you; ask him what’s the matter. Come in, doctor.” She threw open the door of the parlor, and introduced Emily. “This is the mistress’s niece, sir. Please try if you can keep her quiet. I can’t.” She placed chairs with the hospitable politeness of the old school—and returned to her post at Miss Letitia’s bedside.