“If he does want another doctor there’s Mr. Adhams—other side of Myddelton Square.” His features relaxed. This remark was his repentance to Elsie, induced in him by her cheerful and unshrinking attitude towards destiny.
“You mean for master, sir?”
“Yes. He may be able to do something with him. You never know.”
“I’m sure I’m very much obliged, sir,” said Elsie eagerly, her kindliness springing up afresh and rushing out to meet the doctor’s spark of feeling. He nodded. He had not said whether or not he would call again to see Joe, and she had not dared to suggest it. She shut the door and locked herself in the house with the two men.
VIII
A Climax
Mr. Earlforward woke up after what seemed to him a very long sleep, feeling appreciably better. He had less pain; at moments he had no pain. And his mind, he thought, was surprisingly clear and vigorous. He had ideas on all sorts of things. Most invalids got their perspective awry—he knew that—but his own perspective had remained absolutely true. Rising out of bed for a moment he found that he could stand without difficulty, which was yet another proof of his theory that people ate a vast deal too much. The doctor had been utterly wrong about him. The doctor had made a mystery about ordinary chronic indigestion. The present attack was passing, as the sufferer had always been convinced it would. A nice old mess of a complication they would have made of it at the hospital! Or more probably he would have been bundled out of the place with contumely as a malingering fraud! He straightened the bed a little, and then, slipping back into it with a certain eagerness, he began to concert plans, to reorganize and resume his existence.
The day was darkening. Four o’clock, perhaps. Elsie? Where was that girl? She ought to be coming. Had she got a bit above herself? Thought she was the boss of the whole place, no doubt, and could do as she chose! An excellent creature, trustworthy, devoted. … And yet—in some things they were all alike. Give them an inch and they’d take an ell. He must be after her. Now what was it he had noticed, or thought he had noticed, when he was last awake? Oh, yes! That was it. His keys. He had missed them from the top of the chest of drawers. He peered in the gloom. They were there right enough. Perhaps hidden before by something else. The room had been tidied, dusted, while he slept. He didn’t quite care for that, but he supposed it couldn’t be helped. Anyhow, it showed that she was not being utterly idle. Of course the girl was not going to bed properly, but she had ample opportunity to sleep. With the shop closed she had practically nothing to do. …
“Fibroid growth.” Fibroid—like fibre, of course. He scarcely understood how a growth could be like fibre; but it was a name, a definition, and therefore reassuring. Much better than “cancerous,” at the worst! An entirely different thing from cancer! But he was dreadfully concerned, frightened, for Violet. If she died—not that it was conceivable—but if she died, what a blank! Sickening! No! He could not contemplate it. Yet simultaneously in his mind was a little elusive thought: as a widower, freed from the necessity of adapting himself to another, and of revealing to another to some extent his ideas, intentions, schemes—what freedom! The old freedom! And he would plunge into it as into an exquisite, warm bath, voluptuously. He would be more secretive, more self-centred, more prudent, more fixed in habit than ever! A great practical philosopher, yes! In no matter what event he would discover compensations. And there were still deeper depths in the fathomless pit of his busy mind, depths into which he himself would do no more than glance—rather scared.
Elsie came in and saw a sinister sick man, pale as the dying, shrunk by starvation, with glittering, suspicious little eyes.
“Oh! So you’ve come, miss!” He wished that he had not said “miss.” It was a tiny pleasantry of reproof, but too familiar. Another inch, another ell!
“Why! You’ve been making your bed again!” she exclaimed.
But she exclaimed so nicely, so benevolently, that he could not take offence. And yet—might she not be condescending to him? Withal, he enjoyed her presence in the bedroom. Her youth, her reliability, her prettiness (he thought she was growing prettier and prettier every day—such dark eyes, such dark hair, such a curve of the lips), and her physical power and health! Her mere health seemed miraculous to him. Oh! She was a godsend. … She had said nothing about Violet. Well, if she had had news she would have told him. He hesitated to mention Violet. He could wait till she began.
“I’ll run and make you some food,” she said.
“Here! Not so fast! Not so fast!” he stopped her.
He was about to give an order when, for the second time, he noticed that her apron was wet in several places.
“Why is your apron all wet?” he demanded sharply.
“Is it?” she faltered, looking down at it. “So it is! I’ve been doing things.” (She appeared to have dropped the “sir” completely.)
The fact was that she had been sponging Joe.
Mr. Earlforward became suspicious. He suspected that she was wasting warm water.
“Why are you always running upstairs?” he asked in a curious tone.
“Running upstairs, sir?”
(Ha! “Sir.” He was recovering his grip on her.)
She blushed red. She had something to hide. Hordes of suspicions thronged through his mind.
“Well, sir, I have to go to the kitchen.”
“I don’t hear you so often in the kitchen,” said he drily.
It was true. And all footsteps in the kitchen could be heard overhead in the bedroom. He suspected that she was carrying on conversations from her own bedroom window with new-made friends in the yard of the next house or the next house but one,
