A fortnight went by, and at sunset one evening Trixie Coventry came out of the bungalow to stroll with lagging feet about the garden. She looked white and weary, yet relief was in her eyes for suspense was over, George was gaining strength. His illness had been sharp, a vicious form of fever contracted in the jungle and encouraged by the journey, as well as by all that had followed on the night of his return. For days and nights after his collapse in the veranda he had either raved and tossed, or lain exhausted and inert scarcely conscious of existence. Fortunately a good nurse had been available, and, as is usual in India, people had been immeasurably kind and helpful. Yet the strain had been severe for Trixie, the watching, the anxiety, the long hot nights, the dread until the doctor could, with truth, assure her that her husband would not die; and underneath it all lay the harrowing uncertainty of what George had been about to say to her when delirium had intervened. Nothing in his wanderings had given her the smallest clue. As frequently happens when sickness causes derangement, the subject nearest his mind had seemingly fled. He babbled of trifles, of things that had never occurred, and complained with fractious persistence that a tortoise-shell cat with no eyes would sit on his bed. Now that was all over, and the terrible weakness that followed had been fought with uninterrupted success, till now he was able to sit propped up in a chair, though looking perhaps, as he said himself, "like a famine-relief-wallah--nothing but eyes and bones." Yet, so far, he had uttered no word to set Trixie's mind at rest on the subject that haunted her thoughts and leavened her joy in his convalescence. His manner, at least, was the same as of old towards her, lover-like, and in addition so grateful for all her care; but she was conscious that sometimes when she was moving about the room, his eyes were fixed on her with an expression she could not define to herself, a mixture of patient interrogation, and--was it doubt? Often during the last two days, now that he was able to talk without subsequent loss of strength, she had resolved to make herself speak, and explain; but always something had stopped her, either her courage had failed, or the nurse had come in, or he had said something commonplace just at the moment which seemed to render that moment unsuitable for a confession. Then this morning, just as she thought she had nerved herself up to the point, he had suddenly asked her to write to Guy Greaves. "Tell him I want to see him," he said; "tell him to try and come over this afternoon." She had glanced at him nervously, swiftly; his voice told her nothing, he might have been bidding her ask any one of his friends in the station to pay him a visit. Also his head was bent, he was patting one of the dogs, so his face was not visible. Therefore she wrote the note without question or comment, and wondered how Guy would feel when he got it!