“We must be frank with ourselves,” he said. “We must tell the doctor the truth. My stroke was shocked away. And sometimes what’s shocked away can only be shocked back.” “That’s an idea,” said Medora. She was always quick to fasten on ideas and his words made her thoughtful for a moment. She registered his statement for future consideration, then flowed on again. She was cheerful, sympathetic, and full of consolation. Indeed, presently, as Kellock grew grateful, she began to think she might be overdoing the part. For it was, if not wholly, at least in large measure an impersonation now. She was acting again, and she played with a purpose and exceeding concern to touch the right note, but avoid overemphasis upon it. Kellock appeared to be in two minds, and he looked at her and held her hand. “I want to say something,” he declared presently; “but I won’t. I’ll keep it off, because I’m not very strong for the moment, and the spoken word once spoken remains. This is a great crisis all round. I hope good will come out of trouble, as it often does. We’ve had enough to shake us cruelly to-day—both of us—and I won’t add to it. And what’s in my thoughts may look different to-morrow, so I’ll keep it there.” “Don’t think any more about anything,” she begged him. “Just let your mind rest, or talk about the lecture. And don’t you think, whatever happens, and whatever is in store for me, that it is going to lessen your great future. Perhaps it was the strangeness of your ideas that made me shrink from them.” He began to discuss his ruling passion. She kept him easily to that. Presently they ate together, and when Ernest Trood drove up in a dog-cart, lent by Mr. Trenchard, he found Kellock calm and contented. Medora sat behind, and joined in the conversation as they trotted through the green lanes to Totnes. The master had sent cheering messages to Jordan, and hoped to see him on the following day. “He’s not a bit troubled,” said Trood. “He reckons that with a man of your fine physique and constitution—a man that lives the life you lead—this is a flea-bite—just a shake-up along of some trifle. And if you’ve got to chuck it and go away for six weeks even, he’s not going to trouble about it.” “Like him,” said Kellock. “But it won’t be any question of six weeks, or six days, Ernest. I’ve got a feeling about this that I shall be right in twenty-four hours, or not at all. I’m not letting it get on my nerves, you understand. If it’s gone, it’s gone. There’s plenty of work for me in the world, whether at the vat, or somewhere else.” “Never heard better sense,” answered the foreman. “All the same, don’t you throw up the sponge—that would be weak. You must remember you’re a great paper maker, Jordan, and there are not any too many of ’em left in England now-a-days. So it’s up to every man that’s proud of his business to stick to it.”