ow.
They had nursed him through brain-fever, through agonies which could
not have been borne with consciousness. The tempest of the mind and the
pains of misfortune went on from hour to hour, from day to day, almost
without ceasing, until at last, a shadow of his former self, but with a
wonderful light on his face which came from something within, he waited
patiently for returning strength, propped up with pillows in the bed
which had been Fleda's own, in the room outside which Jethro Fawe had
sung his heathen serenade.

It was the room of the house which, catching the morning sun, was best
suited for an invalid. So she had given it to him with an eagerness
behind which was the feeling that somehow it made him more of the inner
circle of her own life; for apart from every other feeling she had,
there was in her a deep spirit of comradeship belonging to far-off times
when her life was that of the open road, the hillside and the vale. In
those days no man was a stranger; all belonged.

To meet, and greet, and pass was the hourly event, but the meeting
and the greeting had in it the familiarity of a common wandering, the
sympathy of the homeless. Had Ingolby been less to her than he was,
there would still have been the comradeship which made her the great
creature she was fast becoming. It was odd that, as Ingolby became
thinner and thinner, and ever more wan, she, in spite of her ceaseless
nursing, appeared to thrive physically. She had even slightly increased
the fulness of her figure. The velvet of her cheeks had grown richer,
and her eyes deeper with warm fire. It was as though she flourished on
giving: as though a hundred nerves of being and feeling had opened up
within her and had expanded her life like some fine flower.

Gazing at Ingolby now there was a great hungering desire in her heart.
She looked at the sightless eyes, and a passionate protest sprang to her
lips which, in spite of herself, broke forth in a sort of moan.

"What is it?" Ingolby asked, with startled face.

"Nothing," she answered, "nothing. I pricked my finger badly, that's
all."

And, indeed, she had done so, but that would not have brought the moan
to her lips.

"Well, it didn't sound like a pricked finger complaint," he remarked.
"It was the kind of groan I'd give if I had a bad pain inside."

"Ah, but you're a man!" she remarked lightly, though two tears fell down
her cheeks.

With an effort she recovered herself. "It's time for you