The sick-room—all due solemnity and importance must be imported into the significance of that word—the sick-room became a shrine¹, served by two ageing priestesses and a naïve acolyte². Everything was done to make Henry an invalid³ in the grand manner. His bed of agony became the pivot⁴ on which the household life flutteringly and soothingly⁵ revolved⁶. No detail of delicate attention which the most ingenious assiduity could devise was omitted from the course of treatment. And if the chamber⁷ had been at the front instead of at the back, the Fulham Vestry would certainly have received an application for permission to lay down straw in the street.  
The sole flaw in the melancholy⁸ beauty of the episode was that Henry was never once within ten miles of being seriously ill. He was incapable⁹ of being seriously ill. He happened to be one of those individuals who, when they 'take' a disease, seem to touch it only with the tips of their fingers: such was his constitution. He had the measles¹⁰, admittedly. His temperature rose one night to a hundred and three, and for a few brief moments his mother and Aunt Annie enjoyed visions of fighting the grim spectre of Death. The tiny round pink spots covered his face and then ran together into a general vermilion. He coughed exquisitely¹¹. His beard grew. He supported life on black-currant tea and an atmosphere impregnated with eucalyptus¹². He underwent the examination of the doctor every day at eleven. But he was not personally and genuinely ill. He did not feel ill, and he said so. His most disquieting¹³ symptom was boredom¹⁴. This energetic organism chafed¹⁵ under the bed-clothes and the black-currant tea and the hushed eucalyptic calm of the chamber. He fervently¹⁶ desired to be up and active and stressful. His mother and aunt cogitated¹⁷ in vain to hit on some method of allaying¹⁸ the itch¹⁹ for work. And then one day—it was the day before Christmas—his mother chanced to say:
 
'You might try to write out that story you told us about—when you are a little stronger. It would be something for you to do.'
 
Henry shook his head sheepishly.
 
'Oh no!' he said; 'I was only joking.'
 
'I'm sure you could write it quite nicely,' his mother insisted.
 
And Henry shook his head again, and coughed. 'No,' he said. 'I hope I shall have something better to do than write stories.'
 
'But just to pass the time!' pleaded Aunt Annie.
 
The fact was that, several weeks before, while his thoughts had been engaged in analyzing²¹ the detrimental²² qualities of the Stream of Trashy Novels Constantly Poured Forth²³ by the Press, Henry had himself been visited by a notion for a story. He had scornfully ejected it as an inopportune intruder; but it had returned, and at length, to get rid for ever of this troublesome guest, he had instinctively²⁴ related the outline of the tale over the tea-table. And the outline had been pronounced wonderful. 'It might be called Love in Babylon—Babylon being London, you know,' he had said. And Aunt Annie had exclaimed: 'What a pretty title!' Whereupon Henry had remarked contemptuously and dismissingly: 'Oh, it was just an idea I had, that's all!' And the secret thought of both ladies had been, 'That busy brain is never still.'
 
As the shades of Christmas Eve began to fall, Aunt Annie was seated by the sick-bed, engaged in making entries in the household washing-book with a lead pencil. Henry lay with his eyes closed. Mrs. Knight²⁵ was out shopping. Presently there was a gentle ting of the front-door bell; then a protracted²⁶ silence; then another gentle ting.
 
'Bless the girl! Why doesn't she answer the door?' Aunt Annie whispered to herself, listening hard.
 
A third time the bell rang, and Aunt Annie, anathematizing the whole race of servants, got up, put the washing-book on the dressing-table, lighted the gas and turned it low, and descended²⁷ to answer the door in person and to behead Sarah.
 
More than an hour elapsed before either sister re-entered Henry's room—events on the ground-floor had been rather exciting—and then they appeared together, bearing a bird, and some mince-tarts on a plate, and a card. Henry was wide awake.
 
'This is a surprise, dear,' began Mrs. Knight. 'Just listen: "With Sir George Powell's hearty²⁸ greetings and best wishes for a speedy recovery!" A turkey and six mince-tarts. Isn't it thoughtful of him?'
 
'It's just like the governor,' said Henry, smiling, and feeling the tenderness of the turkey.
 
'He is a true gentleman,' said Aunt Annie.
 
'And we've sent round to the doctor to ask, and he says there's no harm in your having half a mince-tart; so we've warmed it. And you are to have a slice off the breast of the turkey to-morrow.'
 
'Good!' was Henry's comment. He loved a savoury mouthful, and these dainties were an unexpected bliss²⁹, for the ladies had not dreamt of Christmas fare in the sad crisis, even for themselves.
 
Aunt Annie, as if struck by a sudden blow, glanced aside at the gas.
 
'I could have been certain I left the gas turned down,' she remarked.
 
'I turned it up,' said Henry.
 
'You got out of bed! Oh, Henry! And[Pg 77] your temperature was a hundred and two only the day before yesterday!'
 
'I thought I'd begin that thing—just for a lark³⁰, you know,' he explained.
 
He drew from under the bed-clothes the household washing-book. And there, nearly at the top of a page, were Aunt Annie's last interrupted strokes:
 
'2 Ch——'
 
and underneath³¹:
 
'Love in Babylon'
 
and the commencement of the tale. The marvellous man had covered nine pages of the washing-book.
 
 
 
Within twenty-four hours, not only Henry, but his mother and aunt, had become entirely³² absorbed in Henry's tale. The ladies wondered how he thought of it all, and Henry himself wondered a little, too. It seemed to 'come,' without trouble and almost without invitation. It cost no effort. The process was as though Henry acted merely as the amanuensis of a great creative power concealed³³ somewhere in the recesses³⁴ of his vital parts. Fortified³⁵ by two halves of a mince-tart and several slices of Sir George's turkey, he filled the washing-book full up before dusk on Christmas Day; and on Boxing Day, despite the faint admiring protests of his nurses, he made a considerable hole in a quire of the best ruled essay-paper. Instead of showing signs of fatigue³⁶, Henry appeared to grow stronger every hour, and to

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