In the welter of
the present, she clutched at the high dignities and distinctions of the
past as at a lifebelt. Not vulgarly, in a spirit of self-aggrandizement;
but in the simple interests of self-preservation, as a means of keeping
endangered sanity afloat. For the distinctions and dignities of that
period were real too, just as uncontrovertible a contribution to her
knowledge of men and of things, just as vital an element in her
experience, as chaos let loose on her now. The one in no degree
invalidated the truth or actuality of the other.
But to keep this in mind, to remember it all the time, while imagination
galloped with fever brought on by chill and exposure, and reason
wandered, losing touch with plain commonsense through the moral shock she
had sustained, was difficult to the point of impossibility. She needed a
witness, visible and material, to the fact of those former happier
conditions; and found it, quaintly enough, in the untidy person and
humorous, quarrelsome, brick-dust coloured face--as much of the said
face, that is, as was discoverable under the thick stiff growth of sandy
hair surrounding and invading it--of the Irish doctor, as he sat by her
bed, ministered to and soothed her with reverent and whimsical delicacy.
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