t he thought of his little Billy, who
was two years old, and who was allowed to spend half an hour with his
father twice each day. His son was very near to his heart. He wondered
how he should make up to Billy for those lost half-hours.

"It is delightful!" Vera said. "I think I should like to lie here for
ever, only the firelight to see by, and you sitting just there to talk
to me."

"We mustn't talk if it hurts your head," Everard said, with tender
caution.

"Well, you to sit there and keep silence, then," she amended.

The divan was not very comfortable. He could not echo her wish that he
should sit so, for ever, silent.

"How is the poor head to-day?" he asked.

"It is like fire," she told him. "Feel."

She hitched herself upward, leant on her elbow, and stretched her neck
forward, bringing her face within easy distance of his own. What could
he do but kiss her forehead?

He had a very gay look when he burst in upon his wife, who was dressing
for dinner.

"So you got her here?" he said. "Isn't that giving you a lot of
trouble, Luce?"

"We mustn't think of the trouble," Lucilla told him. "I shall not be
able to be with her always, but fortunately you and she get on so
well----"

"Oh, I daresay I can find time to sit with her, now and then, if that's
all you want me to do," he acquiesced, looking down his nose.

"She seems really sadly," Lucilla told him. "Her head is bad, and her
nerves--she's all nerves! Then, she has a sort of seizure, now and
then----"

"Heavens!"

"Yes. She suddenly becomes, she says, rigid. Can't move hand or foot."

"I say, that must be bad. And what do we do then, Luce?"

"Well," said Lucilla, calmly surveying herself in the glass, and
turning her long neck to get a view of her elegant back, "in that case
you will have to carry her up to bed, and I shall have to undress her
and send for the doctor."

"I carry her!" he said to himself, doubtfully, again and again as he
dressed. "She's something of a lump for any man to carry."

He was considered a handsome man by himself and his friends; by no one
could he be considered a fine one. Lucilla--he admired her long,
graceful figure still--was as tall as he, and he knew himself lacking
in muscular strength. "I hope she won't become rigid here," he said.

She had all her meals served in the drawing-room, and she partook of
every course, and had a really fine appetite. Plates with biscuits,
with grapes, basins with beef-tea, g