And I knew Giulia La Guardia was the only patient who
wasn't doing well at last accounts. Just what is the trouble?"
John leaned forward and began to tell her about the child. Her blue
eyes glanced up and down, back and forth, from him to her sewing, as
she listened, and occasionally asked a question. They had both
forgotten everything but the room and themselves, when they heard a
genial male voice in the hall.
"No, indeed, my dear girl," it said, "I don't need to be announced
in the very least. I'll go straight in."
And in just as brief a time as it might take an active young man to
shed his overshoes and his raincoat, in walked Clarence Rutherford,
as gay as always, and unusually secure of his welcome.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
PIRATE COUSINS TO THE RESCUE
"Thought I'd drop in and tell you some inspiriting news, it's such a
beastly night," said he with _empressement_. "--Princess Melisande!
What have they been doing to you?" he broke off to ask tenderly under
his breath. "Our little princess turned into a Cinderella!"
His tone was calculated to induce self-pity in the breast of an
oyster. But Joy, though she liked it mildly, did not feel moved to
tears. Clarence was an interruption, even if a flattering one.
"My mother is ill," explained John, when Clarence had greeted him
also in his most setting-at-ease manner. ("Kind of a man who'd try
to make you welcome in your own house!" he growled under his breath.
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