She did not especially care.

She was his wife, let what would happen--his erring but repentant Ethie.

She had a right to be there with him, and so at last she took his thin hand between her own, and caressed it tenderly.

Then Richard moved, and moaning in his deep sleep seemed to have a vague consciousness that someone was with him.

Perhaps it was the nurse who had been with him at night on one or two occasions; but the slumber into which he had fallen was too deep to be easily broken.