“Shall I go and fetch Doctor Percy?” he asked, moving round the foot of the bed.

He caught her eye for a moment then, and it was like the eye of a wild bird imprisoned in a boy’s hand. She huddled herself against the wall at the bed’s head, her head bowed upon her folded arms, her body as rigid as the form on the bed.

Something about the nape of her small neck, as she hung there, with drooping head and tense, taut limbs, hit Wolf through the heart.

“Don’t you mind, O my dear truelove! Don’t you mind!” he whispered desperately, clasping and unclasping his fingers, but not daring to approach her. His consciousness of her mood was so intense that when he thought of trying to take her in his arms he saw her wild white face and flashing eyes turned upon him⁠—turned against him with terrible words!

“Do you want me to go for that doctor, Chris?” he repeated, in a dull, flat, wooden voice.