The Three Sisters Part 41

"Hasn't he said anything?"

"He hasn't said a word. And you went away without saying anything."

"There isn't much to say that you don't know----"

"I know why she was ill. You told me. But I don't know why she's worse. She _was_ better. She was quite well. She was running about doing things and looking so pretty--only the other day. And look at her now."

"It's like that," said Rowcliffe. "It comes and goes."

He said it quietly. But the blood rose into his face and forehead in a painful flush.

"But why? Why?" she persisted. "It's so horribly sudden."

"It's like that, too," said Rowcliffe.

"If it's like that now what is it going to be? How is it going to end?

That's what you _won't_ tell me."

"It's difficult----" he began.

"I don't care how difficult it is or how you hate it. You've got to."

All he said to that was "You're very fond of her?"

Her upper lip trembled. "Yes. But I don't think I knew it until now."

"That's what makes it difficult."

"My not knowing it?"

"No. Your being so fond of her."

"Isn't that just the reason why I ought to know?"

"Yes. I think it is. Only----"

She held him to it.

"Is she going to die?"

"I don't say she's _going_ to die. But--in the state she's in--she _might_ get anything and die of it if something isn't done to make her happy."

"Happy----"

"I mean of course--to get her married. After all, you know, you've got to face the facts."

"You think she's dying now, and you're afraid to tell me."

"No--I'm afraid I think--she's not so likely to die as to go out of her mind."

"Did you tell my father that?"

"Yes."

"What did he say?"

"He said she was out of her mind already."

"She isn't!"

"Of course she isn't. No more than you and I. He talks about putting the poor child under restraint----"

"Oh----"

"It's preposterous. But he'll make it necessary if he continues his present system. What I tried to impress on him is that she _will_ go out of her mind if she's kept shut up in that old Vicarage much longer. And that she'd be all right--perfectly all right--if she was married. As far as I can make out he seems to be doing his best to prevent it. Well--in her case--that's simply criminal. The worse of it is I can't make him see it. He's annoyed with me."

"He never will see anything he doesn't like."

"There's no reason why he should dislike it so much--I mean her illness. There's nothing awful about it."

"There's nothing awful about Ally. She's as good as gold."

"I know she's as good as gold. And she'd be as strong as iron if she was married and had children. I've seen no end of women like that, and I'm not sure they don't make the best wives and mothers. I told your father that. But it's no good trying to tell him the truth."

"No. It's the one thing he can't stand."

"He seems," said Rowcliffe, "to have such an extraordinary distaste for the subject. He approaches it from an impossible point of view--as if it was sin or crime or something. He talks about her controlling herself, as if she could help it. Why, she's no more responsible for being like that than I am for the shape of my nose. I'm afraid I told him that if anybody was responsible _he_ was, for bringing her to the worst place imaginable."

"He did that on purpose."

"I know. And I told him he might as well have put her in a lunatic asylum at once."

He meditated.

"It's not as if he hadn't anybody but himself to think of."

"That's no good. He never does think of anybody but himself. And yet he'd be awfully sorry, you know, if Ally died."

They sat silent, not looking at each other, until Gwenda spoke again.

"Dr. Rowcliffe--"

He smiled as if it amused him to be addressed so formally.

"Do you _really_ mean it, or are you frightening us? Will Ally really die--or go mad--if she isn't--happy?"

He was grave again.