CHAPTER II.
Henry and Arthur Hindes had been the only children of their parents, and, as young men, had been much attached to each other; Arthur, perhaps, caring for Henry more than Henry did for him, as he joined admiration of his elder brother’s abilities and address to his affection. His principal thought in coming home had been the meeting with Henry again, and the reality proved a bitter disappointment to him. He lay awake half the night trying to find some reason for his brother’s unaccountable conduct, but was unable to think of any illness, except that of the brain, that could make him behave in so extraordinary a manner.
He determined, therefore, that, whether Henry liked it or not, it was his duty toconsult a specialist on his behalf, and get him, if possible, to pay him a visit. His first action, therefore, in the morning was to inquire for and gain an interview with an eminent brain doctor, to whom he related, as well as he was able, all that had occurred since his arrival in England.
The great man listened to him with polite attention and in perfect silence. He was a slender, delicate-looking man, with a bald head, mild eyes and a pale complexion. No novice, to look at him, would have imagined that that quiet eye of his had the power to quell the ravings of the greatest lunatic who ever tried to dash his keeper’s brains out. But, as he sat quietly with clasped hands and gazed at him, Captain Hindes felt his influence without inviting it.
‘A sad story, Captain Hindes,’ he said, when Arthur had finished; ‘and it may be you have guessed the truth. But no disease is so subtle as that of the brain, and I can give no opinion without seeing your brother.’
‘I am so afraid he would not admit you,’ replied Arthur. ‘His wife tells me he has such an abhorrence (forgive the term) of all medical men. But someonemustsee him. I feel sure of that.’
‘Could you not introduce me as a friend of your own? Under any circumstances, you could not tell him who I am. It would defeat my efforts. I must observe him quietly and by myself,’ said Doctor Govan.
‘He is so morose and apparently averse to any company,’ replied Arthur. ‘I suppose you could not manage to see him at his office on pretence of doing business?’
‘No, I’m afraid I should not play therôleof a business man sufficiently well to escape detection. But, if you approve of the plan, I might pay him a visit at his own house some evening, in company with yourself, and be introduced as a fellow-passenger of yours from India. I have travelled in the East, so am equal to the occasion. Only give me half-an-hour in which to observe him at my leisure in hisown home, and I shall be able to satisfy you if your surmises are correct or not.’
‘Very good,’ replied Captain Hindes. ‘What evening will suit you, doctor?’
‘I can go to-night, if you are sure your brother will be at home.’
‘I will wire to my sister-in-law, and let you know the result at once.’
‘Very well, sir. I will hold the time at your disposal for, say, the next hour.’
Arthur thanked him, and withdrew to the nearest telegraph office, whence he sent a wire to Hannah, waiting there till he had received her reply. It was satisfactory.
‘We shall be at home this evening, and glad to see you.’
‘We shall be at home this evening, and glad to see you.’
With this, Arthur hastened back to Doctor Govan, and received his promise to meet him at the entrance of The Old Hall gates at eight o’clock that night. They were both punctual, and walked up the drive together. The servant admitted them to the library, where his master andmistress usually spent their evenings, and they found Hannah sitting at her needlework by the lamplight, whilst her husband lounged in a chair with a newspaper on his knees, but apparently doing nothing.
‘Well, Hal!’ exclaimed Arthur, cheerfully, after he had saluted his sister-in-law, ‘how are you? I should have looked you up before this, but I have been occupied half the day with a friend and fellow-passenger of mine, Doctor Govan. Let me make you known to one another. Doctor, this is my brother, Mr Hindes.’
As Hannah heard the profession of the stranger mentioned, she threw a quick glance towards Henry, to see how he would take it, but seemingly he had forgotten the breach of good manners of which he had been guilty the night before, and recovered his good temper, for he welcomed both his brother and his friend heartily.
‘Delighted to see you both,’ he said. ‘Hannah, my dear, ring for brandy and soda. My wife says I behaved like a bear last night, Artie, in breaking up yourparty so soon; but I was confoundedly sleepy, old chap, and that’s a fact, so you must forgive me.’
‘Why, Hal, I don’t think you need begin making excuses to me at this time of day,’ replied his brother, who looked at the doctor, nevertheless, to see how he took this very brief mention of a great insult.
But Doctor Govan’s face was imperturbable, and no index to his feelings. He accepted a glass of brandy-and-soda, and entered into a pleasant conversation with Henry Hindes respecting his business and shipping prospects, whilst Arthur maintained small talk with Hannah. At last a diversion was effected by the sound of a child’s whimpering outside.
‘Wally being carried off to bed,’ said his mother, smiling. ‘He is a very spoilt boy, I am sorry to say, and it is seldom effected without a controversy.’
‘Wally,’ cried his uncle. ‘Oh, do have him in, Hannah! You forget I have not been introduced to my nephew yet.’
‘It is so late,’ she said, demurringly,as she glanced at the clock, ‘eight o’clock. He ought to have been in bed half an hour ago. And he may worry Doctor Govan.’
‘I’m sure he won’t,’ replied Arthur, as he sprang towards the door; ‘here, nurse, bring that youngster this way. His mamma wants him,’ he continued, and in another minute the little fellow ran into the room and hid his face in his mother’s lap.
It was evident how his father loved him. Henry Hindes’s features lighted up with paternal affection as his little son appeared, and he called the child to him and placed him on his knee, that all the room might admire him. Master Wally was really a splendid specimen of a boy, notwithstanding his plainness, with his head of thick, curly hair, his large, dark eyes, and dimpled neck and shoulders showing above his embroidered frock.
‘This is not a bad specimen to carry on the family of the Hindes, eh, Arthur?’ inquired his father, proudly, as he passed his hand over the infant’s curls.
‘He is a magnificent boy,’ said his brother, enthusiastically, ‘and I don’t wonder you are proud of him, Henry. Why, he would make two of our little Charlie! And how fat he is! He must weigh about fifty pounds.’
‘And he is really very intelligent for such a baby,’ interposed Hannah; ‘he has taught himself all his letters from his picture alphabet, and draws wonderfully for so young a child.’
‘Yes,’ added Henry Hindes, proudly, ‘we are not at all ashamed of our son and heir. We consider he is as good as most.’
‘I don’t remember ever to have seen a finer child,’ said Doctor Govan, willing to add his meed of admiration for the parents’ pleasure, ‘but you must be careful how you press so active a brain. Never forget that the body and the brain cannot grow together, unless at the expense of one or the other. Let him do nothing but play now! Half a dozen years hence will be plenty of time to begin cramming him. If the true history of mostmurderers could be traced back, it would be found that their brains had been unduly charged when young, and broken down, or become abnormal under the process. You don’t want this little man to develop into a criminal, I’m sure,’ said the doctor, as he kindly patted the boy’s shoulder.
But Henry Hindes’s manner had completely changed. He snatched the child from the stranger’s reach, and rose majestically from his seat.
‘What do you mean?’ he demanded, ‘by coupling my child’s name with that of a murderer? Have you come here to insult me? I will not let you touch him again. I never heard of such a thing in my life! Perhaps you are a murderer yourself, since it comes so pat to you to talk of them. Leave my house at once! I will not have my children’s ears contaminated by hearing of such things!’
‘Henry! Henry!’ pleaded his wife, ‘what are you saying? This gentleman is our guest—a friend of Arthur’s. You must not speak to him like that! You can’t be well!’
‘Not well!’ he exclaimed vehemently, ‘that’s what you’re always cramming down my throat nowadays. What is there about me that is not well? I suppose you want to get rid of me, and hope, by always dinning the lie, that I’m not well, into my ears, that you’ll frighten me into dying. But you’re mistaken! I’ll live in spite of you! And is this the reason,’ he continued, turning fiercely upon Arthur, ‘that you brought this man to my house? You know I hate doctors. I told you yesterday that I don’t believe in them. Why is he here? Tell me the truth at once!’
‘There is nothing to tell, Henry,’ replied his brother, in a tone of vexation, ‘except that, since you choose to behave so unlike a gentleman, it will be the last time my friends ever intrude on you. I thought, in bringing Doctor Govan to my brother’s house, that I was ensuring him the treatment due to his name and profession, but I see I was mistaken. We will not stay to be affronted any longer, so I will bid you good-night.’
He was turning away, wounded and unhappy, as he spoke, when a yell from little Wally arrested his footsteps. Henry, in his excitement, had dropped the child heedlessly on the carpet, where it lay screaming, whilst its father rubbed his hand in a bewildered manner through his hair. Hannah rushed to her baby and picked it up.
‘That is always the way,’ she said, indignantly, as she soothed the boy. ‘He pretends to be so fond and proud of Wally, and yet, at the slightest provocation, he hurts or frightens him. That is why I did not wish to have him down, Arthur,’ she whispered to her brother-in-law; ‘I never bring him in contact with his father, if I can help it.’
‘I am so sorry. I did not know,’ said Arthur, with a look of commiseration. ‘Come, Doctor Govan, I think we have been here long enough.’
‘Yes, my object is effected,’ returned the doctor, as he followed him out of the room.
Hannah ran off, at the same moment,with her child to the nursery, and Henry Hindes was left standing in the library alone. Captain Hindes did not speak until they were clear of The Old Hall and its surroundings, and then, as he and the doctor were finding their way back to the railway station, his tongue was loosed.
‘Well, doctor?’ he said, interrogatively, ‘I suppose, after what has happened, that you have no doubt of the case.’
‘Not the slightest, my dear sir! Your brother is no more mad than you are!’
Arthur turned round short, and regarded him with astonishment.
‘Not mad?’ he ejaculated. ‘Then what makes him behave in so extraordinary a manner?’
‘That I cannot tell you. There may be a dozen causes for it. I went there simply to satisfy you with regard to danger to his brain. Well, as far as I can see at present, there is none! He has recourse to stimulant of some sort or another. It may be spirits, or it may be a narcotic, which has shattered his nerves and weakened his controlover himself. But he is not mad; you may rest assured of that; nor do I think he will ever go mad. The brain is more stupefied than excited.’
‘But what, then, makes him behave so strangely? Doctor, if you will believe me, my brother was one of the most pleasant-mannered men about town. He was always scrupulously well-dressed, and had all the bearing and appearance of a courtier. He was remarkable for it, being a business man. Now, he is rude, uncertain and slovenly. He seems to have lost his memory, too, and his business habits are, I am told, falling off. What can be the reason?’
‘Drink, my dear sir—you will excuse my saying so, for I am not at all prepared to say that Mr Hindes takes more liquor than is good for him—but stimulant in any shape, be it alcohol or morphia, will have all the effect you describe on a man. May I ask if your brother has experienced any great shock lately, that may account for his having recourse to sedatives?’
‘Well! about nine or ten months ago, his partner’s daughter was killed by a fall, which so much affected her father that he died also a few weeks afterwards. Henry was a great friend of old Crampton’s, and had known the girl from a child, so he naturally felt their loss, so did his wife, but hardly, I should imagine, to such a degree as to make him take to intemperate habits. Of course, it was a shock, because it happened so suddenly; but our father died of heart disease—was well one hour, and dead the next—yet it did not affect my brother in this terrible fashion.’
‘Has he had any trouble in business, Captain Hindes—any monetary losses?’
‘I am sure not. On the contrary, when Mr Crampton died, he left half his fortune, a very large one, to that little chap we saw this evening. I heard it was a stipulation that the money was to accumulate in the business till the boy comes of age. I should say my brother was never so well off, with regard to money, as he is at the present moment.’
‘Well, of course these things are not to be accounted for, unless one knows all the inner workings of a man’s mind, but that Mr Hindes is in the habit of taking more morphia than is good for him, I am certain.Whyhe takes it, opens up a different question! He has a very powerful brain, and, naturally, a well regulated one, and it must have taken a large quantity of drugs, or he has indulged in them for a considerable time, to bring him to his present condition. I have said he is not mad, and I repeat my dictum, but I do not say that, if he continues his habits of taking morphia (or some other drug as deadly in its effects), that he will not reduce his brain to the level of madness, or a condition equally deplorable.’
‘Good Heavens! how horrible!’ cried Arthur.
‘You have sought my opinion, Captain Hindes, and I have given you a faithful one,’ said Doctor Govan, as they parted at the station; ‘if you have your brother’s welfare at heart, wean him, if possible, fromthis most pernicious habit, otherwise he will assuredly kill himself by it.’
Arthur Hindes returned to his hotel in the lowest spirits. He had never kept a secret from his wife, who was truly one with him in every sense of the word, so he told her all that had transpired between him and the doctor, and asked her what she would advise in the matter.
Edith thought for a moment, and then replied,—
‘Since we have been talking about going into the country, Artie, wouldn’t it be better if we went to Switzerland, or some mountainous district instead, and persuaded Henry and Hannah to accompany us? Away from London, and living under your own eye, you would be able to exert a better influence over him than here. Perhaps, then, you might, as the doctor said, wean your brother from this dreadful habit. I am sure poor Hannah is unhappy about it. The tears were standing in her eyes several times at the theatre last evening.’
‘How can she be otherwise than miserable to see such a change in him? But have you calculated, my darling, what your proposal will entail on you? To live in the same house, for months, perhaps, with a man who may be as obnoxious to you as a drunkard. For this craving for morphia is very like drunkenness in its effects. It renders a man irresponsible for his actions, and may be the occasion of many unpleasant scenes between us. Am I justified in exposing you and the children to such things?’
‘He is your only brother, Arthur, and you love him. That is enough for me. Were the consequences to be twice as disagreeable, I would risk them for your sake. Do what you think right in the matter, and trust me to do all I can to second your efforts.’
‘You’re the dearest wife a man ever had,’ replied her husband, kissing her pretty face, ‘and I thank you very much. Your plan is an excellent one, if I can only get Hal to accede to it. He will make allsorts of excuses about the business, of course, but I will not leave him alone until he consents to take a change. If it were only for a few weeks, it would be better than nothing.’
‘Artie, dear, take my advice and don’t speak to Henry about it first. Go and see Hannah. She is a sensible woman, and you can tell her all the doctor said, and enlist her on your side. She loves her husband—I am sure of that—and will be delighted to second any plan that is for his benefit.’
‘Yes, dear, you are right again. To gain Hannah’s consent will be gaining another ally. We shall be three against one. Henry must yield to us then. I will go over and speak to her to-morrow morning. You have lifted a load off my mind, Edith. I feel as if we must succeed now.’
Accordingly, the following morning, as Hannah was sitting at home, with little Wally playing at her feet, her brother-in-law was announced. Her first thought was to make some excuse for her husband’s behaviour of the night before.
‘Oh, Arthur, I am glad to be able to speak to you alone,’ she commenced. ‘It shocked me that poor Henry was so irritable last evening. Your friend must have thought he was insane. But that is the worst part about his illness. You can never be certain of him for ten minutes together. What did Doctor Govan think of such an outburst? What did he say?’
‘He didn’t say much, Hannah. You see, he is a medical man and used to such things.’
‘But it made me feel so ashamed,’ continued the wife, with the suspicious moisture in her eyes, ‘and I hope you will not think me ungracious, Arthur, if I ask you not to bring any more of your friends here without giving us notice. Henry had been irritable all the afternoon, and if I had known a stranger was coming, I should have coaxed him to go to bed before you arrived.’
‘I am very glad you didn’t, Hannah, for I am going to tell you a secret. Doctor Govan is no friend of mine. I never seteyes on him till yesterday morning. I brought him here expressly that he should see Henry in his own home, and be able to report on his health, without his being aware he was examined by an expert.’
‘An expert!’ exclaimed Hannah, paling. ‘What do you mean?’
‘A specialist, then, if you prefer the term—anyway, a medical man who is at the top of the tree.’
‘But why—why?’ she said, with a startled gaze.
‘Because I felt very much alarmed about his condition. His conduct at the theatre the other night, joined to his altered manners and appearance, all combined to make me think that he must have had some shock to addle his brain. Hannah, don’t be angry, but Henry has behaved to me, ever since I came home, like nothing short of a madman, and it made me very uneasy about him.’
‘And was—this—this gentleman a mad doctor, and did you bring him here to examine my husband?’ she inquired with surprise.
‘He was; and I certainly brought him here that he might give me a truthful report on Henry’s condition,’ replied Captain Hindes.
‘How dared you?—how dared you?’ she panted.
‘Why, Hannah, I never thought you would take it like this! I consider that you have somewhat neglected your duty, in not having called in a doctor to him long ago. I think my brother is in a very critical state. Doctor Govan does not, I am glad to say, consider him mad, but he says he will drive himself so if he is not carefully watched in the future. He pronounces him to be suffering from the effects of opium, or some other narcotic, and that he has weakened his brain by its use, and is hardly responsible for his actions. Henry is my brother, you must remember, Hannah, as well as your husband, and it is my duty to look after him. Doctor Govan says that, if we cannot wean him from the habit he has fallen into, he will inevitably kill himself by it. Now, Edith and I havebeen talking the matter over, and came to the conclusion that we must all act in concert. I am willing to take my wife and family to Switzerland, or any distant place we may agree upon, if you and Henry will join us there, so that I may have him under my own eye, and do my best to restore him to health. You will do your part, I am sure, Hannah, and persuade your husband to consent to this arrangement.’
‘I will not!’ replied Hannah, with closed lips.