About the middle of March they started for the East, intending to take the trip leisurely and visit points of interest along their route.
They arrived in New York early in May, and were intending to sail for England the last of the month.
But Virgie, although not really ill, was far from well when they reached the great metropolis, and her husband insisted that she must have medical advice.
He called in a skillful physician, who, upon being told what their plans were, immediately and emphatically vetoed further travel for the present.
"It will be simply impossible for Mrs. Heath to undertake a sea voyage at present," he asserted.
"But the trip occupies eight days—" Sir William began.
"If it occupied only three it would make no difference it will not be safe for her to attempt to cross the ocean under three months," Dr. Knox said, with an air of decision which admitted of no further argument.
Sir William was disappointed, yet he was too fond and careful of his beautiful wife to rebel against this verdict.
A week or two passed and Virgie appeared to be improving, when, one morning, there came a cablegram from Heathdale, announcing that the dowager Lady Heath was alarmingly ill, and imploring the baronet's immediate return if he desired to see her alive.
The message threw the young husband into a distressing state of mind.
It seemed like harshest cruelty to obey the summons and leave his wife alone in that strange city. And yet the alternative of remaining and allowing his mother to die without seeing him once more, seemed almost equally unkind.
He sought Dr. Knox again in his extremity and explained his desperate situation.
"I could not answer for the consequences if you take your wife; it will be a fearful risk for Mrs. Heath to go. She <i>might</i> endure the voyage safely, but the probabilities are that she would not," the physician gravely told him. "But," he added, kindly, "I sympathize with you—I appreciate your dilemma, and, if <i>you</i> must go, I advise you to leave her in my charge and I promise faithfully to give her every attention during your enforced absence."
This seemed the only thing to be done and Sir William finally decided to return to his home alone.
Virgie herself urged him to go, though her heart was almost breaking at the thought of the separation, for it <i>might</i> be that she would never see him again.