Page:Harvey O'Higgins--Don-a-dreams.djvu/422

 Walter coughed. "Well, you don't seem much excited!"

He laid aside his pipe. "Sit down, won't you? I'll get Margaret."

He went down the inner hall to their bedroom. Walter Pittsey looked around at Bert. They exchanged glances of amused perplexity. The younger brother laughed: "He's one too many for me."

But if Don was not enthusiastic, Margaret, in dressing-gown and "mules," more than made up his lack of spirit. "Oh, Don!" she cried. "Your first play! What did he say? Tell me! Tell me—every thing!"

Walter told her what little there was to tell; and Bert added his quota of good news about Conroy. "His father arrived at six o'clock. There was a pressure on the brain. They operated to relieve it, and they're going to take him home as soon as he can be moved. He wants to go." He turned to Don. "That bump on the head has done the business for him."

Don smiled, crookedly. "I—I hope" He did not say what he hoped. He leaned forward in his chair and put his face in his hands. "I'm—I've had a bad day, I guess," he faltered. "I feel . . . rather . . . knocked out myself."

Margaret went to him, and knelt on the floor beside him, and put her arms across his shoulders. "Don," she whispered. "What is it? Are you ill?"

He did not answer.

She tried to draw his hands from his face to see him. She found his fingers wet. "O—oh!" She looked up at the Pittseys, her lips trembling.