Page:MacGrath--The luck of the Irish.djvu/322

 I'll see to the nurse and order the ice myself. It's a good thing it's winter. I'll have a punka rigged up for the daytime. Until I return you will apply cold compresses; that is, wet the towel frequently and lay it upon her head. Don't be afraid if it drips."

"How long will it last?"

"If it's a slight attack, two or three weeks; if it is serious, a month or more. It depends upon the severity of the congestion—what kind of mental trouble brought it on. But don't get worried; just keep saying to yourself that she's going to pull through, and she will."

All through the long night William sat by the bed. Sometimes he cracked the artificial ice for the nurse, or he put Ruth's threshing arms under the coverlet, or he stood listening to her incoherent babble, hoping in vain to hear his own name. It was of a past he knew but little—the days with her father.

"Go to bed, Mr. Grogan," advised the nurse when three o'clock came around. "You need sleep, lots of it, if you're going to help me. You'll have to do something in watching during the day, until the crisis is past."

William had not engaged any room for himself at the hotel. His idea had been to seek out some near-by boarding-house. He wanted to leave Ruth with a sense of absolute freedom. She alone was registered, and only as Miss Warren. In other parts of the world this would have complicated affairs, but not in Singapore.