"Is old Mr. Wright worse?" Martha called downstairs, when the doctor
let himself in at midnight.
"No."
"Well, where on earth have you been?" Mrs. King demanded. She was
leaning over the banisters in her gray flannel dressing-gown, her
candle in its hooded candlestick, throwing a flickering light on her
square, anxious face.
William, locking the front door, made no answer. Martha hesitated, and
then came down-stairs.
"I must say, William, flatly and frankly, that you--" she paused. "You
look tired out, Willy?"
William, fumbling with the guard-chain, was silent.
"Come into the dining-room and I'll get you something to eat," said
his wife.
"I don't want anything to eat."
Martha glanced at him keenly. His face was white and haggard, and
though he looked at her, he did not seem to see her; when she said
again something about food, he made no answer. "Why, William!" she
said in a frightened voice. Then with quick common sense, she put her
alarm behind her. "Come up-stairs, and go to bed. A good night's sleep
will make a new man of you." And in a sort of cheerful silence, she
pushed him along in front of her. She asked no more questions, but
just as he got into bed she brought him a steaming tumbler of whiskey
and water. "I guess you have taken a little cold, my dear," she said.
William looked at her dumbly; then realizing that there was no escape,
drank his whiskey, while Martha, her candle in one capable hand,
waited to make sure that he drained the last drop. When he gave the
glass back to her, she touched his shoulder gently and bade him go to
sleep. As she turned away, he caught that capable hand and held it in
both of his for a moment.
"Martha," he said, "I beg your pardon."
"Oh, well," said Martha, "of course, a doctor often has to be out
late. If you only don't come down with a cold on your lungs, it's all
right."
"I sha'n't come down with a cold on my lungs," said William King.
The letter Helena wrote Lloyd Pryor after she had picked herself up,
sobbing, from the floor, had no diplomacy about it. Things had
happened; she would not go into them now, she said, but things had
happened which made her feel that she must accept his offer to carry
out their original plan. "When I got your letter, last week, I did
hesitate," she wrote, "because I could not help seeing that you did
not feel about it as you used to. But I can't hesitate any longer. I
must ask you--"