The evening was a very pleasant one.  Messrs. Errol and Perrowne rejoiced to hear the good news from the sick room, and Mrs. Carmichael gave the former to understand, in a vague, yet to his intelligence perfectly comprehensible, way, that the assurance of her daughter’s future happiness would remove a large obstacle in the way of her becoming the mistress of the manse.  Mr. Perrowne appreciated Dr. Halbert’s consideration in leaving his daughter at Bridesdale.  The Du Plessis quartette were even farther advanced than the Carmichael four; and consequently Miss Graves was left to the entertainment of Mr. Douglas.  The patient upstairs awoke, feeling very stiff and sore, but quite rational, and almost too happy to speak, which was a good thing, as his strength was that of a baby.  He had to be lifted and turned, and propped up and let down, which the Squire generally did for him, under the head nurse’s instructions, received from the doctor.  Then he had to be fed, and begged to have his moustache curtailed, so as to facilitate the task.  Two little hands, a comb, and a pair of scissors went to work, and, without annihilating the hirsute adornment, so trimmed it as to reveal a well-curved upper lip, hitherto almost invisible.  It is astonishing what a sense of proprietorship this “barberous operation,” as she termed it, developed in the heiress, who thought more of it than of her prospective thousands.  It was past ten o’clock before she consented to yield her post to the devoted Wilkinson, who already began to look upon her as a sister, and to whom she gave directions, with all the gravity and superior dignity of an experienced nurse.  The colonel would willingly have taken his turn in the sick room, but Mr. Terry, Mr. Douglas, and the Squire insisted on relieving him.  Mr. Bangs was away with Ben Toner and two guns hunting for the Grinstun man.  The watchers got along very well through the night, with the exception of the veteran, who was a little too liberal in the application of stimulants, which led to a reappearance of fever, and necessitated his calling in the aid of the ever-willing and kindly Honoria.  Both the clergymen had volunteered to sit up with him, whom they were proud to call their friend, but it was not considered fair to impose upon them after the labours of their hardest day.

The morning saw Miss Carmichael in the sick room again, putting things to rights, purifying and beautifying it, as only a woman can, with the romantic and tearful, Shakespeare loving Tryphosa in her train.  Poor little neglected Marjorie, who had performed for her young self an art of heroic sacrifice in handing over her own Eugene to her unworthy cousin, was allowed, a great and hitherto unheard of reward, to bring the patient an armful of flowers from the garden, gathering any blossoms she chose, to fill vases and slender button-hole glasses in every corner.  She was even permitted to kiss Eugene, although she protested against the removal of that lovely moustache.