“I know, I know,” Rex replied. “Somebody told me. Who was it? Sam, I believe. He saw her. She came up close and looked at me. It was a trick, a joke, a lie! I have been made the subject of a lot of late, and it hurt me some, and you, Tom, were in it, too! _Et tu, Brute!_ we used to read at school, but I never thought I should one day be Cæsar!” A glimmer of reason was asserting itself for a moment, and Tom’s eyes filled with tears as he said: “Yes, Rex, I was in it, and I am so sorry. We are all sorry. Rena most of all.” At the mention of Rena, Rex’s manner changed at once. “Yes, Rena,” he said, with a ring of pleasure in his voice, “Rena, with the little soft hands which take the eyes away. She can catch them! Where is she? I want her. She’s the girl, you know, the other was somebody else, very grand and tall and beautiful, and lives in Claremont instead of New York, and is not the one Sandy meant. That was Rena—your Rena, I want her.” He was talking at random again, and Rena, who heard her name, went into the room. “I am here,” she said, going up to him, while he took his hands from Tom and gave them to her. There was no talk of eyes or hair or anything after Rena sat down beside him. He did not say much, but slept a long time, which was a gain, and we began to hope that the fever would reach the crisis at the end of a week instead of running longer, as we had at first feared. Rena stayed till night, and only left then because Tom insisted that she should go. “I owe him something,” she said, “and I shall come every day till he is better,” and the next morning she was at her post, looking rather pale and hollow-eyed, but determined and brave. She had brought Irene’s note received the evening before in the letter telling of Johnnie’s death. “Don’t show it to him now. Wait till he can sense it,” Tom said. He was taking the lead in the sick-room and was so strong and masterful that Rex continued to improve, and, greatly to our delight, a few days saw the breaking of the fever and the clearing of the mists which had clouded his brain. CHAPTER XXI REX’S EXPERIMENT Rex was very weak but his mind was clear. The eye was gone, and if he remembered it he never spoke of it, but lay very quiet and seemed very happy when Rena was with him, as she was every day. He never mentioned Irene, but Rena told him at last of Johnnie’s death, and gave him Irene’s note, which he read and then put under his pillow, saying: “I am sorry for her, and there’s nothing to forgive. Tell her so when you write.” That was all, and Tom felt sure that the chapter of Rex’s life as connected with Irene was closed. “But she will try to reopen it,” he said to Rena. “She’ll be coming here. You’ll see.”