Slowly
her old interest in all they had had in common returned, and to the
messages from outside she gave again a kindlier ear.
"Allan tells me," she said one day, when she was alone with her father,
"that I can have no more children. And I'm glad of that. But at least I
have one," she added, "and he has already made me feel like a different
woman than before. I feel sometimes as though I'd come a million miles
along in life. And yet again it feels so close, all that I left back there
in school. Because I'm so much closer now--to every mother and every child.
At last I'm one of the family."
CHAPTER XLII
Of that greater family, one member had been in the house all through the
month which had just gone by. But he had been so quiet, so carefully
unobtrusive, that he had been scarcely noticed. Very early each morning,
day after day, John had gone outside for his breakfast and thence to the
office where he himself had handled the business as well as he could, only
coming to Roger at night now and then with some matter he could not settle
alone, but always stoutly declaring that he needed no other assistance.
"Don't come, Mr. Gale," he had urged. "You look worn out. You'll be sick
yourself if you ain't careful. And anyhow, if you hang around you'll be
here whenever she wants you."
Early in Deborah's illness, John had offered to give up his room for the
use of one of the nurses.
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