Page:Gaskell - North and South, vol. I, 1855.djvu/208

 "My dear young lady, your mother seems to have a most attentive and efficient servant, who is more like her friend—"

"I am her daughter, sir."

"But when I tell you she expressly desired that you might not be told—"

"I am not good or patient enough to submit to the prohibition. Besides, I am sure, you are too wise—too experienced to have promised to keep the secret."

"Well," said he, half-smiling, though sadly enough, “there you are right. I did not promise. In fact, I fear, the secret will be known soon enough without my revealing it."

He paused. Margaret went very white, and compressed her lips a little more. Otherwise not a feature moved. With the quick insight into character, without which no medical man can rise to the eminence of Dr. Donaldson, he saw that she would exact the full truth; that she would know if one iota was withheld; and that the withholding would be torture more acute than the knowledge of it. He spoke two short sentences in a low voice, watching her all the time; for the pupils of her eyes dilated into a black horror, and the whiteness of her complexion became livid. He ceased speaking. He waited for that look to go off,—for her gasping breath to come. Then she said:—

"I thank you most truly, sir, for your confidence. That dread has haunted me for many weeks. It is a true, real agony. My poor, poor mother!" her lips began to quiver, and he let her have the relief of tears, sure of her power of self-control to check them.