She became quiet at once. Another phase of the doctor's character showed: his will power. The loving anxiety was suppressed. The practical woman was to the fore, intent on the doctor's instructions:
"She must be undressed and put to bed. Have a fire here; it must be kept going night and day. Send one of your maids"--he was writing on a leaf of his note-book as he spoke, and finishing, tore it out--"with this prescription at once."
Gracie was fever-stricken! Tossed in delirium all that night and the next day. All the next day and night--and the mother sat by the bedside, tending, never leaving the little one.
The doctor came three and four times a day. Each time he looked grave. There was no sign of improvement in the child's condition. The mother, worn out with watching, ever looking to him for comfort, read none.
Did ever--during all those hours of wearing, waiting, anxious watching--the thought of Masters cross her mind? She had shut him resolutely out of her heart, turned the key of consciousness upon him. But even bolts and bars are proverbially of small efficacy in such cases.
In those long hours, the only silence breaking sounds were the monotonous ticking of the clock and the short, quick breathing of the little white-robed, white-faced form on the white pillows. Sometimes, then, the woman's resolution broke down; thoughts of The Man crept in upon her all unbidden. Gentler thoughts than she had harboured in the previous days: troubles' softening influence was around.
Their first meeting! She thought of that. Of his affection for Gracie; of the child's love for him. Surely a child's instinctive love and trust went for something. Perhaps, after all--and then those horrible words of his rang in her ears, and she hid her hot face in the white coverlet. Never, never--they were unforgivable. Besides, he did not seek forgiveness.
Strange that, by the bedside of the panting child, with Life and Death fighting for possession of the fragile little form, her ears ever straining to catch the sound of that softer breathing which she knew would signal Life's victory--strange, that with fear and hope surging in her bosom, even while her gentle hand restrained her dear one's restless tossing to and fro and cooled the burning forehead and feverish, clinging little fingers; strange that there should seem no wrong, nothing incongruous in the thought of an almost stranger--of William Masters. Perhaps it was because Gracie loved him so dearly: that must have been the reason.