‘Very nice weather,’ said Nurse Hopkins.
Old Gerrard said crossly:
‘May be for you. ’Tisn’t for me. My lumbago’s been at me something cruel.’
Nurse Hopkins said cheerfully:
‘That was the wet spell last week, I expect. This hot dry weather will soon clear that away.’
Her brisk professional manner appeared to annoy the old man.
He said disagreeably:
‘Nurses—nurses, you’m all the same. Full of cheerfulness over other people’s troubles. Little you care! And there’s Mary talks about being a nurse, too. Should have thought she’d want to be something better than that, with her French and her German and her piano-playing and all the things she’s learned at her grand school and her travels abroad.’
Mary said sharply:
‘Being a hospital nurse would be quite good enough for me!’
‘Yes, and you’d sooner do nothing at all, wouldn’t you? Strutting about with your airs and your graces and your fine-lady-do-nothing ways. Laziness, that’s what you like, my girl!’
Mary protested, tears springing to her eyes:
‘It isn’t true, Dad. You’ve no right to say that!’
Nurse Hopkins intervened with a heavy, determinedly humorous air.
‘Just a bit under the weather, aren’t we, this morning? You don’t really mean what you say, Gerrard. Mary’s a good girl and a good daughter to you.’
Gerrard looked at his daughter with an air of almost active malevolence.
‘She’s no daughter of mine—nowadays—with her French and her history and her mincing talk. Pah!’
He turned and went into the lodge again.
Mary said, the tears still standing in her eyes:
‘You do see, Nurse, don’t you, how difficult it is? He’s so unreasonable. He’s never really liked me even when I was a little girl. Mum was always standing up for me.’
Nurse Hopkins said kindly:
‘There, there, don’t worry. These things are sent to try us! Goodness, I must hurry. Such a round as I’ve got this morning.’
And as she stood watching the brisk retreating figure, Mary Gerrard thought forlornly that nobody was any real good or could really help you. Nurse Hopkins, for all her kindness, was quite content to bring out a little stock of platitudes and offer them with an air of novelty.
Mary thought disconsolately:
‘What shall I do?’
Mrs Welman lay on her carefully built-up pillows. Her breathing was a little heavy, but she was not asleep. Her eyes—eyes still deep and blue like those of her niece Elinor, looked up at the ceiling. She was a big, heavy woman, with a handsome, hawk-like profile. Pride and determination showed in her face.
The eyes dropped and came to rest on the figure sitting by the window. They rested there tenderly—almost wistfully.
She said at last:
‘Mary—’
The girl turned quickly.
‘Oh, you’re awake, Mrs Welman.’
Laura Welman said:
‘Yes, I’ve been awake some time…’
‘Oh, I didn’t know. I’d have—’
Mrs Welman broke in:
‘No, that’s all right. I was thinking—thinking of many things.’
‘Yes, Mrs Welman?’
The sympathetic look, the interested voice, made a tender look come into the older woman’s face. She said gently:
‘I’m very fond of you, my dear. You’re very good to me.’
‘Oh, Mrs Welman, it’s you who have been good to me. If it hadn’t been for you, I don’t know what I should have done! You’ve done everything for me.’
‘I don’t know… I don’t know, I’m sure…’ The sick woman moved restlessly, her right arm twitched—the left remaining inert and lifeless. ‘One means to do the best one can; but it’s so difficult to know what is best—what is right. I’ve been too sure of myself always…’
Mary Gerrard said:
‘Oh, no, I’m sure you always know what is best and right to do.’
But Laura Welman shook her head.
‘No—no. It worries me. I’ve had one besetting sin always, Mary: I’m proud. Pride can be the devil. It runs in our family. Elinor has it, too.’
Mary said quickly:
‘It will be nice for you to have Miss Elinor and Mr Roderick down. It will cheer you up a lot. It’s quite a time since they were here.’
Mrs Welman said softly:
‘They’re good children—very good children. And fond of me, both of them. I always know I’ve only got to send and they’ll come at any time. But I don’t want to do that too often. They’re young and happy—the world in front of them. No need to bring them near decay and suffering before their time.’
Mary said, ‘I’m sure they’d never feel like that, Mrs Welman.’
Mrs Welman went on, talking perhaps more to herself than to the girl:
‘I always hoped they might marry. But I tried never to suggest anything of the kind. Young people are so contradictory. It would have put them off ! I had an idea, long ago when they were children, that Elinor had set her heart on Roddy. But I wasn’t at all sure about him. He’s a funny creature. Henry was like that—very reserved and fastidious… Yes, Henry…’
She was silent for a little, thinking of her dead husband.
She murmured:
‘So long ago…so very long ago… We had only been married five years when he died. Double pneumonia… We were happy—yes, very happy; but somehow it all seems very unreal, that happiness. I was an odd, solemn, undeveloped girl—my head full of ideas and hero-worship. No reality…’
Mary murmured:
