When they got courage finally to tell her, Fanny only smiled and said
nothing. But she ate less and smiled more and steadily grew weaker and
weaker and as steadily refused to see her husband.
"No," she said quietly, "there's nothing I want to see John about and
there's nothing for him to see me about any more. I guess," she smiled
at the gruff old doctor, "you're about the only man I can stand the
sight of or who would put up with me."
"Fanny," Doc Philipps told her, "if you don't buck up and get well, if
you die on my hands, it will be the first mean thing you ever did."
"Oh, well--it would be the last," laughed Fanny.
"Fanny, don't you know that Seth Curtis and nearly all the town comes
here at least once a day? How do you suppose John and Seth and the
rest of us will feel if you just quit and go?"
And then in bitterness of heart Fanny answered.
"Oh, I'm tired of living, of being snubbed and made fun of. I'm past
caring how anybody else will feel. I tell you I'm a misfit. God never
took pains to finish me. I've been a miserable failure, no good to
anybody. My children will be better off without me. John said so."
"My God!" groaned the old doctor, "did John say that?" He knew now
that no medicine that he could give, no skill of his would mend a heart
bruised like that.
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