“Shall I go for the doctor myself, Alice?” he asked. “No, sir, _do not_,” interposed the nurse significantly. “You had much better stay here.” Whilst he was below giving directions, Alice and the nurse administered a steaming hot bath to Maurice; but it was of no avail, his breathing was as laboured as ever. The nurse going downstairs, on an errand, met her master returning. “Well, is he better?” he asked eagerly. “No, sir; but worse! How long will it be before the doctor comes?” “An hour, at the least,” replied Sir Reginald. “An hour’s the very most he will last, poor lamb.” “Is he so very bad as all _that_?” inquired her master, turning deadly pale. “Very bad. He could not be worse! Will you please to stay with my lady whilst I am away--if anything do happen to the child, she’ll go clean out of her mind, for certain--it’s a terrible pity Mrs. Mayhew is away, and Miss Saville is no more use than a child herself.” “Shall I have her called? Surely she has some experience.” “No, sir; the fewer people in the nursery the better; and I’m afraid that all the experience in the country could not save the child _now_--he’s desperate bad.” So saying, this Job’s comforter continued her way downstairs, leaving Sir Reginald to take her place with his wife. He stood for a moment to collect his thoughts, and then quickly ascended to the nursery, where he found the child on Alice’s lap, fighting and gasping for breath--a most heartrending sight. His mother, perfectly collected so far, but as white as marble, was soothing him with such soft endearments and caresses as only a mother knows. When her husband entered, she raised her sweet pathetic eyes to his, as if in mute entreaty for help for her child. “I wish I knew something to suggest, Alice,” he said, coming over to the table, near which she was sitting; “I am a capital nurse if it were typhoid fever or broken bones; but I know nothing about children. There is an old book on household medicine in the library, we might find some hints in it. Shall I fetch it?” “Do, and don’t be long,” she answered. In a few minutes he had returned with the book, over which they pored together--the barrier between them was completely broken down for the time being by this common anxiety. Alice found herself ordering him hither and thither as if he were Geoffrey. None of the remedies suggested were of any use, as there was no medicine-chest in the house, and a mustard plaster and hot bath had been already tried in vain. Reginald lifted the child from Alice’s arms and laid him in his bed, saying that he would have more air. Presently the nurse returned, and, standing at the foot of the cot, surveyed the little patient critically. Whilst Alice was bending over him, she approached her master and whispered in his ear: “It is all over with him; another fit like the last and he will choke; he can’t live above a quarter of an hour.”