
January 25.—We had just finished our tea, when who should come
in but Cummings, who has not been here for over three weeks. I
noticed that he looked anything but well, so I said: “Well, Cummings,
how are you? You look a little blue.” He replied:
“Yes! and I feel blue too.” I said: “Why, what’s
the matter?” He said: “Oh, nothing, except that I
have been on my back for a couple of weeks, that’s all.
At one time my doctor nearly gave me up, yet not a soul has come near
me. No one has even taken the trouble to inquire whether I was
alive or dead.”
I said: “This is the first I have heard of it. I have
passed your house several nights, and presumed you had company, as the
rooms were so brilliantly lighted.”
Cummings replied: “No! The only company I have had was
my wife, the doctor, and the landlady—the last-named having turned
out a perfect trump. I wonder you did not see it in the paper.
I know it was mentioned in the Bicycle News.”
I thought to cheer him up, and said: “Well, you are all right
now?”
He replied: “That’s not the question. The question
is whether an illness does not enable you to discover who are your true
friends.”
I said such an observation was unworthy of him. To make matters
worse, in came Gowing, who gave Cummings a violent slap on the back,
and said: “Hulloh! Have you seen a ghost? You look
scared to death, like Irving in Macbeth.” I said:
“Gently, Gowing, the poor fellow has been very ill.”
Gowing roared with laughter and said: “Yes, and you look it, too.”
Cummings quietly said: “Yes, and I feel it too—not that
I suppose you care.”
An awkward silence followed. Gowing said: “Never mind,
Cummings, you and the missis come round to my place to-morrow, and it
will cheer you up a bit; for we’ll open a bottle of wine.”