His wife's welfare did not enter into his calculations.
So they stopped in Essex, where matters went as the doctors had foretold, only more quickly than they expected.

Lady Jane's complaint grew rapidly worse, so rapidly that soon there was no question of her going abroad.

At the last moment Sir John grew frightened, as bullies are apt to do, and on receipt of an indignant letter from Lord Lynfield, now an old man, who had been informed of the facts by his grand-daughter, offered to send his wife to Egypt, or anywhere else.
Again the doctors were called in to report, and told him with brutal frankness that if their advice had been taken when it was first given, probably she would have lived for some years.

As it was, it was impossible for her to travel, since the exertion might cause her death upon the journey, especially if she became seasick.
This verdict came to Isobel's knowledge as the first had done.

Indeed, in his confusion, emphasized by several glasses of port, her father blurted it out himself.
"I wonder whether you will ever be sorry," was her sole comment.
Then she sat down to watch her mother die, and to think.