"Rachael's well," George said. "She looks--well, she shows what she's
been through; but she's very handsome. And the boys are fine. We had
the whole crowd down as far as Shark Light for a picnic last Sunday.
Rachael has little Breck Pickering down there now; he's a nice little
chap, younger than our Katrina--Jim's age. The youngster is in
paradise, sure enough, and putting on weight at a great rate."
"I didn't know he was there," Warren said slowly. "Like her--to take
him in. I wish I had been there--Sunday. I wish to the Lord that it was
all a horrible dream!"
He stopped and sat silent, looking gloomily at the floor, his whole
figure, George thought, indicating a broken and shamed spirit.
"Well, Magsie's settled, at least," said George after a silence.
"Yes. That wasn't what counted, though," Warren said, as Rachael had
said. "She is settled without my moving; there's no way in which I can
ever make Rachael feel that I would have moved." Again his voice sank
into silence, but presently he roused himself. "I've come back to work,
George," he said with a quiet decision of manner that George found new
and admirable. "That's all I can do now. If she ever forgives me--but
she's not the kind that forgives. She's not weak--Rachael. But anyway,
I can work. I'll go to the old house, for the present, and get things
in order. And you drop a hint to Alice, when she talks to Rachael, that
I've not got anything to say. I'll not annoy her."
George's heart ached for him as Warren suddenly covered his face with
his hands. Warren had always been the adored younger brother to him,
Warren's wonderful fingers over the surgical table, a miracle that gave
their owner the right to claim whatever human weaknesses and failings
he might, as a balance. George had never thought him perfect, as so
much of the world thought him; to George, Warren had always been a
little more than perfect, a machine of inspired surgery, underbalanced
in many ways that in this one supreme way he might be more than human.
George had to struggle for what he achieved; Warren achieved by divine
right. The women were in the right of it now, George conceded, they had
the argument. But of course they didn't understand--a thing like that
had nothing to do with Warren's wife; Rachael wasn't brought into the
question at all. And Lord! when all was said and done Warren was
Warren, and professionally the biggest figure in George's world.
"I don't suppose you feel like taking Hudson's work?" said George now.
"He's crazy to get away, and he was telling me yesterday that he didn't
see himself breaking out of it. Mrs. Hudson wants to go to her own
people, in Montreal, and I suppose Jack would be glad to go, too."
"Take it in a minute!" Warren said, his whole expression changing. "Of
course I'll take it. I'm going to spend this afternoon getting things
into shape at the house, and I think I'll drop round at the hospital
about five. But I can start right in to-morrow."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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