Their tour had been, naturally, drawing to its close. Tregellan indeed had
an imperative need to be in London within the week. It seemed, therefore, a
clear dispensation of Providence, that the amiable doctor should prove an
hospitable person, and one inspiring confidence no less. Caring greatly for
things foreign, and with an especial passion for England, a country whence
his brother had brought back a wife; M. le Docteur Mitouard insisted that
the invalid could be cared for properly at his house alone. And there, in
spite of protestations, earnest from Sebastian, from Tregellan halfhearted,
he was installed. And there, two days later, Tregellan left him with an
easy mind; bearing away with him, half enviously, the recollection of the
young, charming face of a girl, the Doctor's niece, as he had seen her
standing by his friend's sofa when he paid his _adieux_; in the beginnings
of an intimacy, in which, as he foresaw, the petulance of the invalid, his
impatience at an enforced detention, might be considerably forgot. And all
that had been two months ago.
II
'I am sorry you don't see it,' continued Tregellan, after a pause, 'to me
it seems impossible; considering your history it takes me by surprise.
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