“That’s what I say, ma’am,” said Rogers. “I’m torn in two, I am. My lord gives me a look! Though he’s choking with his cough, he does like this with his finger; and then he points to her, and he does like that----” Rogers imitated first the motion of beckoning and then that of pushing away. “I will speak to the doctor when he comes,” said Agnes. “But oh, Rogers, you would never have the heart to leave him? What does it matter about the nurse? Try to make her useful. She does know a great deal, and she might be useful----” “She don’t know nothing about my lord. Miss ’Ill, nobody but me knows my lord,” said Rogers solemnly. “I know just what he’ll bear, and what he won’t bear. He can’t be treated like an ’ospital case. And that’s what them women do. As if he was just a number in a bed! He’s been very different all his life, has my lord; and that’s what he won’t bear.” “No,” said Agnes soothingly, “of course he won’t bear it; and you must just stand between him---- Rogers, what is that? I am sure I heard a carriage driving up to the door.” “It will be someone coming to inquire,” said Rogers. “Don’t you be frightened, Miss ’Ill. If I can get free of that woman, don’t you be miserable. We’ll pull him through.” “Do you think it can be anyone coming to inquire?” cried Agnes. “Surely there is a great commotion downstairs. Oh, Rogers, for Heaven’s sake go and see what it is. I heard a cry. What’s that? What’s that? Surely I know that voice.” Agnes did not know what she feared. There were sounds on the stair which denoted some strange events--many voices together--the sound of steps hurrying. She stood at the door half afraid to open it, listening intently, overcome with alarms which she could not explain. What had happened? The voices came nearer, one of them talking in gentle but persistent tones. Agnes threw up her arms and uttered a wild but faint cry. What did it mean? What could it mean? The wildest hallucination, or her sister’s voice? And then the door was opened quickly, and into the wintry daylight, in which there was no mystery, Mary walked without excitement--smiling, yet with a serious face, as if she had never left her own house where she was supreme, but was coming upstairs after a private consultation with the doctor, in which he had told her that her husband was ill, but not so ill as to cause any extreme of anxiety. She came in smiling to Agnes, and, taking both her hands, kissed her. “I am so glad,” she said, “to find you here. Then Frogmore has had someone to rely upon. Fancy I have been away on a visit, and they never told me he was ill till to-day.”