She rattled on in the gayest of moods, making him laugh in spite of the terror. The failure of the operation in the left eye she put aside as of no account. One eye was a necessity, but two were a mere luxury.
"And it is the little rogue that will reap the benefit," she cried, cuddling the child. "For, when he is naughty mammy will turn the blind side of her face to him."
"And will you turn the blind side of your face to me?" asked Jeremy with a quiver of the lips.
She took his hand and pressed it against her cheek.
"You have no faults, my beloved husband, for me to be blind to," she said, wilfully or not misunderstanding him.
Such rapture had the sight of the child given her that she insisted on its lying with her that night, a truckle-bed being placed in the room for the child's nurse. When Jeremy took leave of her before going to his own room he bent over her and whispered:
"To-morrow."
Her sweet lips—pathetically sweet below the bandage—parted in a smile—and they never seemed sweeter to the anguished man—and she also whispered, "To-morrow!" and kissed him.
He went away, and as he closed the door he felt that it was the gate of Paradise shut against him for ever.
He did not sleep that night, but spent it as a brave man spends the night before his execution. For, after all, Jeremy Wendover was a gallant gentlemen.