'Do for me?' he said--'why, shut the window. I might have died for all you
would have known or cared.'

She walked across the room and shut the window, but as she came back to her
place she said, 'I don't know why you speak to me like that, Ralph.'

'Prop me up: if I lie so low I shall get bad again. If you had a touch of
this asthma you'd know what it is to lie alone for hours.'

'For hours, Ralph?' Kate repeated, and she looked at the clock and saw that
she had not been asleep for more than half an hour. Without contradicting
him--for of what use would that be, only to make matters worse?--she
arranged the pillows and settled the blankets about him, and thinking it
would be advisable to say something, she congratulated him on seeming so
much better.

'Better! If I'm better, it's no thanks to you,' he said. 'You must have
been mad to leave the window open so long.'

'You wanted it open; you know very well that when you're very bad like that
you must have change of air. The room was so close.'

'Yes, but that is no reason for leaving it open half an hour.'

'I offered to shut it, and you wouldn't let me.'

'I dare say you're sick of nursing me, and would like to get rid of me. The
window wasn't a bad dodge.'

Kate remained silent, being too indignant for the moment to think of