A violent tremor seized her so that her teeth chattered. With his arm
about her Roger forced her gently to lie down, noting with growing
alarm the fixed glitter of her eyes and the moisture standing in beads
upon her forehead, above which her bronze hair ruffled in damp curls.
All at once it had become appallingly easy to believe that she was
suffering from the delusion of persecution, that her brain, somehow
disordered, had fabricated a whole history of terror. Sick at heart he
yet recalled the doctor's counsel against allowing her to excite
herself.

"Esther, dear," he said soothingly. "You must keep quite quiet and
trust to me. Remember your nerves are bound to be upset after all that
morphia you have had. You know that."

He stopped, afraid that he had said the wrong thing, but she only
frowned thoughtfully as though considering his words.

"Morphia," she repeated to herself. "Yes, I suppose that is what it
was. No wonder I feel queer.... And then of course I haven't had
anything to eat for two days and a half--that makes it worse."

"Two days and a half!"

He stared at her aghast. This last speech of hers sounded amazingly
rational. He burned to question her, yet dared not attempt it.

"The doctor said you were to have something if you waked up," he said
quietly, as though there were nothing out of the way. "There's
something here ready in a little saucepan. I've only got to heat it
up. Shall I give it to you?"

She nodded and lay motionless, watching with languid eyes the blue
flame of the spirit-lamp as he made ready a cup of broth, then
submitted with the docility of a child while he put another pillow
under her head and fed her the hot liquid, a spoonful at a time,
slowly, for fear of making her sick. When she had finished she sank
back with closed eyes, and he thought a faint tinge of warmer colour
crept into her cheeks. For what seemed to him a long period there was
complete silence. He gazed at her with searching eyes, tortured by
doubts and questionings. When he had begun to think she had again
fallen asleep, she quietly spoke.

"That was good," she murmured; "I needed that.... It's a long time to
go without food, you get so weak."

He could bear the suspense no longer. So cautiously he said:

"My dear, how was it you didn't have anything to eat for two and a half
days? What do you mean?"

She looked at him for a long puzzled moment, then drew her hand across
her brow.