A few moments later, she arose quietly and kissed David and left him.
Early in the morning he went to Peoria and saw the doctor who told him the entire truth. Winstrom said, "You are the eldest son, of whom she spoke to me?"
"What did she tell you about me?" David asked.
"If your father discovered that she had consulted me, or if any other of the family came, I was to reassure them as much as possible; but she said to tell you the entire truth."
David fought the truth, when it was told, and he tried to deny it; but the doctor took the time to show that there was no doubt of the condition.
David declared, "I'll send her away." But Winstrom, like Brailford, shook his head and said, "In a case like this, the most merciful course is to allow her to keep at her duties as long as she can and to let others learn only as they must."
At noon, David returned to Itanaca and he telegraphed Fidelia saying again that he would stay away for another night and that he would explain later; for he could put no adequate explanation in a telegram. He stayed, in fact, far into the following day and it was late in the afternoon when he took a train for Chicago.
He had spent most of his hours close to his mother and had occupied himself so completely with home affairs that he had seen few others than the family and had visited Mr. Fuller only for a brief, perfunctory call.
As he sat by the car window, watching the dusk
