“Beats all! You a nuss, and I never knew it! I’m that weak that you could knock me down with a feather,” Mrs. Parks said, as she followed me to my room and stayed there while I made the necessary preparations for going with Mr. McPherson. The carriage was waiting at the gate and he was upon the piazza listening to Sam, who had come to the house and was telling of his interview with Mr. Travers in the grove only a few hours before. With a delicacy for which I had not given him credit, Sam said nothing of what he saw at the well the previous day when the glass was broken. That was reserved for Lottie’s ear, and he only told of meeting Mr. Travers, who complained of the heat and a pain in his head and walked shaky like, when he got up to go home. “Why didn’t you go with him?” Rena asked, all her womanly instincts of pity roused for Rex, who might die and never know. “I did offer and he wouldn’t let me,” Sam replied, and Rena continued to Mr. McPherson: “Is he out of his head all the time? Would he understand if one were to tell him something?” The idea had seized her that if Tom did not return at the end of the week she would confess everything to Rex. She could not have him die and leave that acted lie on her soul. It would be hard to tell him, but she must do it. She had been the instigator of the plot and ought to suffer for it. To her question as to whether Rex could understand if told something important Mr. McPherson’s answer was not reassuring. “He is rambling mostly, and I don’t think he would sense much, but,” he added, as he saw the look of distress in Rena’s face, “he’ll pull through. Lean, lanky fellows like him generally do. It’s the strappers, full of blood like Giles, who die.” Rena shuddered, and as I just then came out she walked with me to the carriage and said very low and earnestly: “I am glad you are going to Mr. Travers. Don’t let him die, and if you want some one with you send for me. Aunt Mary says I am very nice with sick people, whose heads ache. There’s magnetism in my hands, small as they are.” She held them up and looked at them; then let them drop in a helpless kind of way, while I wondered at her manner, but promised to send for her if I needed her. “And you will let us know how he is every day—twice a day, if possible?” she added. I was in the carriage by this time, and Mr. McPherson was waiting to get in when Rena said again: “Remember and send if you want me. I am a pretty good nurse.” “You?” Mr. McPherson said with a laugh. “You’d be no more good than a fly.” “Try me and see,” Rena answered, looking up pleadingly at him as he took his seat beside me. “All right,” he said. “Good-bye. Write to Irene to-night and tell her to keep a stiff upper lip. We’ll pull him through.” Then Nixon started up the horses and I was on my way to the McPhersons as nurse to Reginald Travers. CHAPTER XIX REX AND RENA