“Come up at once, your father sinking fast.⁠—

Mother

.”

“Come up at once, your father sinking fast.⁠— Mother .”

He read it with a choking sensation. One would have thought he couldn’t feel anything after these last hours, but he felt this. Half-past seven, a train from Reading at nine, and madame’s train, if she had caught it, came in at eight-forty⁠—he would meet that, and go on. He ordered the carriage, ate some dinner mechanically, and went upstairs. The doctor came out to him.

“They’re sleeping.”