Through the dark
nights--though a trained nurse was in attendance--it was Juliet's hand
that held her up, Juliet's low calm voice that reassured her in the
Valley of the Shadow through which she wandered. Often too spent for
speech, her eyes would rest with a piteous, child-like pleading upon
Juliet's quiet face, and--for Juliet at least--there was no resisting
their entreaty. She laid all else aside and devoted herself body and soul
to the tender care of the sick woman.
Edward Fielding regarded her with reverence and a deep affection that
grew with every day that passed. She was always so gentle, so capable, so
undismayed. He knew that her whole strength was bent to the task of
saving Vera's life, and even when he most despaired he found himself
leaning upon her, gathering courage from the resolute confidence with
which she shouldered her burden.
"She never thinks of herself at all," he said once to Saltash between
whom and himself a friendship wholly unavoidable on his part and also
curiously pleasant had sprung up. "I suppose in her position of companion
she has been more or less trained for this sort of thing. But her
devotion is amazing.
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