A private operation had gone badly. He had bungled with his
dressings, so that the surgeon had turned on him in a burst of irritation.
"Better go home and sleep it off, Stonehouse."
He had not gone. He would not admit that he was ill--dared not. All
illness now meant the end of everything. It would wipe out all that they
had endured if he were to break down now. It would kill Christine. She
must not even guess.
He hung about the hospital common-room. The summer heat surging up from
the burning pavements stagnated between the faded walls. He could not
touch the food that he had brought with him. He was faint and sick, and
the long table at which he sat, with its white blur of newspapers, rose
and fell as though it were floating on an oily sea. But he held out. At
five o'clock he was to meet Francey at the gates, and, as though she had
some magic gift of relief, he strained towards that time, his head
between his hands, his ears counting the seconds that dripped heavily,
drowsily from the moon-faced clock.
And then she did not come. Outwardly it was only one more trifle,
capable of simple explanations. But he saw it through a disfiguring haze
of fever, and it was deadly in its significance. He hardly waited. He
crossed the thoroughfare, and once in a side street stumbled into a
shambling run. He did not stop until he reached her house. His former
reluctance broke before the imperative need to see her and make sure of
her.
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