CHAPTER XXVIII
It was a few days before Joe Sidney was allowed to see Barbara. The news of her friend’s death had been broken to her by the doctor, and though her grief was profound she bore the shock better than they had feared likely, and continued to make good progress towards recovery.
It was on the day following that on which she learnt the truth, or rather a bowdlerised version of it, that Sidney refused to be longer denied, and practically forced his way into the private room at the hospital to which she had been moved.
At sight of her sad, tear-stained face, framed in bandages, and wearing such a different aspect from when he had last looked on it, the little speech he had prepared to greet her with died on his lips, and he could only take her hand in silence and gaze at her without a word till the door had shut behind the nurse, who, dearly as she would have liked to remain, was luckily prevented from doing so by an urgent summons to attend on the house surgeon elsewhere.
“Oh, my dear, I thought you were dead,” he stammered.
She was very weak still, and while the tenderness in his voice, still more than the words themselves, brought a feeble little smile of the purest content to play a moment round the corners of her mouth, they also caused the blood to rush to her face in a hot, embarrassing wave, so that she turned her head away, and lay facing the wall with no conscious wish except to hide from him.
Then the flush died away, leaving her very white and still and silent, with eyes tightly shut. She knew that if she opened them or tried to speak she would not be able to help crying.
Sidney did not understand her stillness. A dreadful fear came upon him that she had fainted, and he looked round for the bell. It was just out of reach; but, when he tried to withdraw the hand which still held hers, her clasp gently tightened on it, and would not let him go.
With a muffled exclamation he fell on his knees beside the pillow.
“Barbara, Barbara,” he cried, “will you always go hand in hand with me now?”
And with face still averted she murmured: “Always, always!”
It was half an hour later that he asked her about the unsigned telegram she had sent him. What had she meant by saying good luck was coming his way?
She reluctantly confessed her determination to provide him with the money he needed.
“Of course I always knew you were clever and dear enough to manage even that,” he said. “That’s why I didn’t bother unnecessarily over the mess I’d got into.”
“Oh,” cried Barbara, “how dare you say that! Why, you were desperate; I was terrified by the things you hinted at.”
“It was disgraceful of me to talk in that way,” he admitted, ashamed. “But you haven’t told me how you intended to provide me with money. As if I’d have taken it from you! I didn’t know you were a millionaire.”
“You know Mr. Vanderstein left me £30,000, which I was to have if poor Mrs. Vanderstein died? I shall get it now, I suppose,” said Barbara, her eyes filling with tears.
Joe stroked her hand in silent sympathy, and with a quaver in her voice she went on.
“Well, I meant to borrow £10,000 on the strength of my prospects, and place it anonymously to your credit at Cox’s. So you see you would have had to take it!” she concluded triumphantly. “You wouldn’t have known who it was from.”
“I should have known perfectly well,” he said. “Who else could good luck come to me from if not from you? I knew you sent the telegram, you see.”
“You couldn’t have proved it, and you’d have had to take the money, because there would have been no one to send it back to.”
“It was like you to think of it,” Joe said, “but I don’t believe you could have raised the money anyhow. Aunt Ruth’s life was nearly as good as yours then, and you hadn’t really any security to offer, you silly darling.”
Barbara’s face fell. “I didn’t think of that, but surely I could have got £10,000 when I would have offered £30,000 in exchange,” she said sadly. “But it doesn’t matter now, does it?”
He hastened to reassure and comfort her.
“And you will never bet again?” she asked presently.
“I have sworn that I never will,” Joe answered. “I’ve had a lesson more severe than even I needed, I think.”
“If ever you want to have a teeny tiny bet,” she smiled, “I can do it for you, perhaps, if you’re good.”
“No, no,” he said seriously, “you must give it up too. I shall want you to help me to stick to my resolutions. Promise!”
“Very well,” she said, seeing how grave he looked; “I promise faithfully never to gamble again in any way, as long as I live.”
“Now we are safe!” he cried. “Indeed, I have used up all the luck one man can scrape together in a lifetime in winning you, and I shall think of that, if I am ever again tempted to stake anything on the chance of further kindness at the hands of Fortune.”
“Don’t be foolish,” Barbara urged; “there is heaps and heaps more luck in store for you.”
And so, in their serene confidence of the happy future which awaits them, we will leave these two young people, who, if any more dangers lie unsuspected in the path down which they are to travel through the years, will brave them no longer in solitary isolation, but strengthened and reinforced by an enduring love.