"But it is Daisy that wants the defences," Mrs. Sandford
cried; "it is she that is running into danger."
"She shall want no defences while she is in my hospital."
"It is very well to say; but if you let her in there, you
cannot help it. She must be in danger, of all sorts of harm."
"If you will prevent it, Mrs. Sandford, you will lay me under
obligations," said the doctor, sitting down and looking up at
his sister-in-law somewhat comically. "I am helpless, for I
have passed my word. Daisy has the command."
"But just look at the figure she is, in that dress! Fancy it!
That is Miss Randolph."
The doctor glanced up and down, over my dress, and his eye
turned to Mrs. Sandford with provoking unconcern.
"But you will not let her stay there, Grant?"
The doctor looked up at me now, and I saw an answer ready on
his lips. There was but one way left for me, I thought; I do
not know how I came to do it, but I was not Daisy that
morning; or else my energies were all strung up to a state of
tension that made Daisy a different person from her wont. I
laid my hand lightly over the doctor's mouth before he could
speak. It silenced him, as I hoped. He rose up with a look
that showed me I had conquered, and asked if I were ready. He
must go, he said.
I did not keep him waiting. And once out in the street, with
my hand on his arm, I was quite Daisy again; as humble and
quiet as ever in my life. I went like a child now, in my
guardian's hand; through the little crowds of men collected
here and there, past the sentinels at the hospital door, in
through the wide, clean, quiet halls and rooms, where Dr.
Sandford's authority and system made everything work, I
afterwards found, as by the perfection of machinery. Through
one ward and another at last, where the rows of beds, each
containing its special sufferer, the rows of faces, of various
expression, that watched us from the beds, the attendants and
nurses and the work that was going on by their hands, caused
me to draw a little closer to the arm on which I leaned and to
feel yet more like a weak child. Yet even then, even at that
moment, the woman within me began to rise and put down the
feeling of childish weakness. I began to be strong.
Out of the wards, into his own particular room and office,
comfortable enough, Dr. Sandford brought me then. He gave me a
chair, and poured me out a glass of wine.
"No, thank you," said I, smiling. "I do not need it."