"The £300, Maurice," his trembling fingers scrawled, showing
how his mind was still torturing itself with those obligations.
"Oh, that's all right," Maurice answered, lightly. "You give me Lord Rockminster's address, and I'll take the check to him myself as soon as the doctors have been here in the afternoon. Don't you worry about that, Linn, or about anything; for you know you mustn't increase that feverishness, or we shall have you a right-down, bona-fide patient on our hands; and then when will you get back to the theatre again? I am going out now to telegraph to Lehmann. But I don't think I need alarm the Winstead people; you see, they don't read the Sunday papers; and, indeed, if I send a note now to Francie, she will get it the first thing in the morning. Linn," he continued, after a moment's hesitation, "are you too much upset by your own affairs to listen to a bit of news? I came with the intention of telling you, but perhaps I'd better wait until you get over these present troubles."
Lionel looked at him, with those bright, restless eyes, for a second or two, as if to gather something from his expression; and then he wrote:
"Is it about Francie?"
Maurice nodded; it was enough. Lionel stretched out his hot hand and took that of his companion.
"I am glad," he said, in a low voice. And then, after a moment or two's thinking, he turned to his writing again: "Well, it is hard, Maurice. I have been looking forward to this for many a day, and have been wondering how I should congratulate you both. And I get the news now—when I'm ruined. I haven't enough money even to buy a wedding-present for Francie!"
"Do you think she will mind that?" Mangan said, cheerfully. "But I'm going to send her your good wishes, Linn—now, when I write. And look here, if she should come up to see you, or your father and mother—for it is quite possible the doctors may insist on your giving your voice a rest for a considerable while—well, if they should come up from Winstead, mind you say nothing about your monetary troubles. They needn't be mentioned to anybody, nor need they worry you; I dare say I shall be able to get something more done; it will be all right. Only, if the Winstead people should come up, don't you say anything to them about these monetary affairs, or connect me with them;
for it might put me into an awkward position—you understand?"
And the last words Lionel wrote on the block of paper before Mangan went out to execute his various commissions were these: