contrast; and it is small wonder that to the watcher the first gleam of returning intelligence in the sick man’s eyes was as the promise of the opening of a door behind which lay an enchanted palace. [16] [16] II. It was yet a day or two before the sick man spoke. He was very weak, and lay for the most part in a deathlike but health-giving sleep. At length the day came when he said feebly:— It “Where am I?” “Here,” his nurse answered, with truly feminine irrelevancy. “Where?” “At Glencarleon.” He lay silent for some moments, evidently struggling to attach some meaning to the name, and to collect his strength for further inquiries. His eyes expressed his mental confusion. “You were hurt in the steamer accident,” she explained. “You came ashore here, and are with friends. Don’t try to talk. It is all right.” He was too feeble to remonstrate,—too feeble even to reason, and he obeyed her injunction of silence without protest. She retreated to her favorite seat by the window, and took up her sewing; but her revery progressed more rapidly than her stitches,[17] and when she was relieved from her post by old Sarah, she stole softly out of the room to continue her dreaming in an arbor overlooking the water, where, in pleasant weather, she was wont to spend her leisure hours. [17] The next day, when she gave her patient his morning gruel, he watched her with questioning eyes, as if endeavoring to identify her, and at last framed another inquiry. “Who are you?” he asked. “I am Columbine.”
Prev.
Back
Top