"He says he ain't himself," she repeated again, with an eager feeling
that perhaps, at last, she had got at the right interpretation of the
gospel of Valentine.
"That is practically the same thing as his saying to you that he was mad.
Now you have told me what you feel for Julian."
Cuckoo flushed, and muttered something unintelligible, twining her hands
in the sables till she nearly pulled them from Doctor Levillier's knees.
"And you have seen the terrible change that has come over him, and that
is fast, fast deepening to something that must end in utter ruin. You
have not seen him these last few days, I think."
"No", said Cuckoo, her eyes fixed hungrily on the doctor's face. She
began to tug at her veil. "What's it? Is he--is he?"
She collapsed into a nervous silence, still tugging with a futile hand at
the veil, which remained implacably stretched across her face. The doctor
looked at her, and said steadily:
"He has gone a little further--down. You understand me?"
"I ought to," she said, bitterly.
"As you are mounting upward," the doctor rejoined, with a kind and firm
gravity that seemed indeed to lift Cuckoo, as a sweet wind lifts a
feather and sends it on high.
The bitterness went out of her face, but she said nothing, only sat
listening attentively while the doctor went on:
"My belief is this, and if you hold it you can perhaps act in this matter
with more boldness, more fearlessness, than if you do not hold it.
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