It was as if a wonderful, beautiful dream
were folding him in--and in.
He drew back. "I am not fit, Miss Dunbar. I did not
know you were here. Why--look at me!"
"Oh! You are ill! You have had an accident!" she cried.
She had laid her little white fingers on his hand and
now, feeling it burn and tremble at her touch, she caught
it in both of her own and drew him into the house.
"Mr. Waldeaux," she said to a servant who appeared,
"has had a fall. Bring him water and towels. Take care
of him, Stephen." She spoke quietly, but her voice
trembled with fright.
The man led George to an inner room.
"Were you thrown, sir?" he asked sympathetically.
George hesitated. "Yes, I was thrown," he said grimly.
He made himself clean in angry haste, taking the
whisk from the man and brushing off the dry mud with a
vicious fury.
Lucy came to meet him, with a pale, anxious smile. "You
must not go without a cup of hot coffee," she said,
leading him to a lounge in the hall. It was very sweet
to be treated like a sick man!
"And God knows I am sick, body and soul!" he thought,
sinking down.
Beside the lounge was a little table with one cover. He
noted with keen pleasure the delicate napery, the silver
candlesticks, the bowl of roses, with which the
substantial meal was set out. Lucy waited on him with
the quick intelligence of a trained nurse. She scarcely
spoke, yet her every motion, as she served him, seemed a
caress.
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