"But that was not to be the end of it. One after another, the
servants at Bisbee Hall were taken with the disease until five of
them were down. Then came the last blow--Mr. Bisbee fell a victim
in New York. So far I have been spared. But who knows how much
longer it will last? I have been so frightened that I haven't
eaten a meal in the apartment since I came back. When I am hungry
I simply steal out to a hotel--a different one every time. I
never drink any water except that which I have surreptitiously
boiled in my own room over a gas-stove. Disinfectants and
germicides have been used by the gallon, and still I don't feel
safe. Even the health authorities don't remove my fears. With my
guardian's death I had begun to feel that possibly it was over.
But no. This morning another servant who came up from the hall
last week was taken sick, and the doctor pronounces that typhoid,
too. Will I be the next? Is it just a foolish fear? Why does it
pursue us to New York? Why didn't it stop at Bisbee Hall?"
I don't think I ever saw a living creature more overcome by
horror, by an invisible, deadly fear. That was why it was doubly
horrible in a girl so attractive as Eveline Bisbee. As I listened
I felt how terrible it must be to be pursued by such a fear. What
must it be to be dogged by a disease as relentlessly as the
typhoid had dogged her? If it had been some great, but visible,
tangible peril how gladly I could have faced it merely for the
smile of a woman like this.
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