“Because he is not Mr. Dick.”

“Well, yes; because he is not Dick.  I suppose his name is Bertie.”

“Not Bertie,” said Rachel, indignantly, “Hugh.”

“It’s a poor, inefficient kind of name, only four letters, and a duplicate at each end.  I don’t think, my dear, he is worthy of you.”

“Dick has only four letters.”

“I make it a rule never to argue with women.  Well, Rachel, I’m glad you have decided to marry.  Heaven bless you, and may you be happy with this man.  Ah! here comes Dr. Brown.”

“Well!” said the Bishop and Rachel, simultaneously.

“She’s better,” said the little doctor, angrily; he was always angry when he was anxious.  “She’s round the first corner.  But how to pull her round the next corner, that is what I’m thinking.”

“Defer the next corner.”

“We can’t now her mind is clear.  She’s as sane as you or I are, and a good deal sharper.  When she asks about her book she’ll have to be told.”

“A lie would be quite justifiable under the circumstances.”

“Of course, of course, but it would be useless.  You might hoodwink her for a day or two, and then she would find out, first, that the magnum opus is gone, and secondly, that you and Miss West, whom she does trust entirely at present, have deceived her.  You know what she is when she thinks she is being deceived.  She abused you well, my lord, until you reinstated yourself by producing Regie Gresley.  But you can’t reinstate yourself a second time.  You can’t produce the book.”

“No,” said the Bishop.  “That is gone forever.”

Rachel could not trust herself to speak.  Perhaps she had realized more fully than even the Bishop had done what the loss of the book was to Hester, at least, what it would be when she knew it was gone.

“Tell her, and give her that if she becomes excitable,” said Dr. Brown, producing a minute bottle out of a voluminous pocket.  “And if you want me I shall be at Canon Wylde’s at five o’clock.  I’ll look in anyhow before I go home.”

Rachel and the Bishop stood a moment in silence after he was gone, and then Rachel took up the little bottle, read the directions carefully, and turned to go up-stairs.

The Bishop looked after her, but did not speak.  He was sorry for her.

“You can go out till tea-time,” said Rachel, to the nurse.  “I will stay with Miss Gresley till then.”

Hester was lying on a couch by the fire in a rose-colored wrapper.  Her small face, set in its ruffle of soft lace, looked bright and eager.  Her hair had been cut short, and she looked younger and more like Regie than ever.

Her thin hands lay contentedly in her lap.  The principal bandages were gone.  Only three fingers of the right hand were in a chrysalis state.

“I shall not be in too great a hurry to get well,” she said to Rachel.  “If I do you will rush away to London and get married.