“Let her speak for herself. I was to send you away when you came. She was not fit to see you, she said. But I am sure it will comfort her to talk to a friend.”
The sister moved away, and Joyce approached Yvonne’s bedside with quick steps. Something serious must have happened.
Yvonne rased a wan, desolate face and eyes heavy with crying, and put out her hand timidly from beneath the bedclothes. He retained it, as he sat down upon the chair just vacated by the sister. The few little cakes he had brought her he placed on the stand near by. She looked too woe-begone for cakes.
“I have come in spite of your message,” he said. “Why did you want to send me away?”
“I am too miserable,” murmured Yvonne, in her broken voice.
“What has happened to make you miserable?” he asked very softly. “Tell me, if it is anything I can hear.”
“It’s my voice that has gone,” cried Yvonne in a sob. “They told me this morning—the doctor brought a throat specialist—I shall never be able to sing again—never.”
Before this sudden calamity the man was powerless for comfort.
“My poor little woman!” he said.
“It is worse than losing a limb,” moaned Yvonne. “I have been dreading it—hoping against hope all along. I wished I had died instead of Dina. I wish I could die now.” The tears came again. She drew away her hand and dabbed her eyes with a miserable little wet rag of a handkerchief.