Two days after the installation of what Mrs. Sykes persisted in calling the "spinal mattress," Esther Coombe was late in getting home from school. As was usually the case when this happened, Jane, designated by mournful Mark as "the Pindling One," was sitting on the gatepost gazing disconsolately down the road. There were traces of tears upon her thin little face and the warmth of the hug which returned her sister's greeting was evidence of an unusually disturbed mind.
"Why aren't you playing with the other children, Jane?"
"I don't want to play, Esther. Timothy's dead."
"Yes, I know, dear. But Fred has promised you a new puppy—"
"I don't want a new puppy. I want Timothy."
"But Timothy is so much happier, Jane. He was old, you know. In the Happy Hunting Grounds, he will be able to frisk about just like other dogs. Wouldn't you like an apple?"
Jane considered this a moment and decided favourably. But her tale of woe was not yet complete. "Mother's ill again," she announced gloomily. "I mustn't play band or nail the slats on the rabbits' hutch. Aunt Amy gave me my dinner on the back porch. I liked that. I wouldn't go in the house, not till you came, Esther."
The straight brows of the elder sister came together in a worried frown.
"You know that is being silly, Jane."
"I don't care."
"You must learn to care. Run now and get the apple and ask Aunt Amy to wash your face."
Jane tripped away obediently, her griefs assuaged by the mere telling of them, and Esther passed into the house by way of the veranda. It was a charming veranda, long and low, opening through French windows directly into the living room which, like itself, was long and low, and charming. There is a charm in rooms which can be felt but not described. It exists apart from the furnishings and even the occupants; it is an essence, haunting, intangible—the soul of the room! only there are many rooms which have no soul.
Through the living room at the Elms vagrant breezes entered, loitered, and drifted out again, leaving behind them scents of sun-warmed flowers. The light there was soft and green. The comfortable chairs invited rest; the polished rosewood table, the bright piano shining in the brightest corner, the smooth old floor in whose rug the colours had long ceased to trouble, the general air of much used comfort, satisfied and refreshed.
Esther loved the room. Her first childish memory was of the rosewood table shining like a pool in the lamplight and of her own wondering face reflected in it, with her father's laughing eyes behind. In every way it was associated with the beginnings of things. The magic of all music began for her in the sweet, thin notes of the old square piano; the key to fairy land lay hidden somewhere in that shelf of well-worn books.
Yet to-night she entered with a hesitating step. It was obvious that she felt no pleasure in the cool greenness. The room was the same room but it was as if the expression on a well-known face had unaccountably changed and become forbidding. The girl sighed as she flung her hat upon a chair.
"Esther," Jane's voice, somewhat obscured by the eating of the promised apple, came through the open window, "are you sure about Timothy being in the Happy Hunting Grounds?"
"Of course, dear."
"But he wasn't what you would call a Christian, Esther?"
"He was a good dog."
"Can Timothy chase chickens there?"
"Probably."
"And cats?"
"Certainly cats."
"Is that what happens to bad cats when they die?"
Esther viewed this logical picture of everlastingly pursued cats with some dismay.
"N-o. I don't suppose it would be real cats."
"But Tim wouldn't chase anything but real cats."
"Jane, I wish you wouldn't talk with your mouth full."
Being thus reduced to giving up the argument or the apple, Jane abandoned the former. It was clear that Esther was not in the mood for argument. The child's quick observation had not failed to note the lagging step, nor the quick sigh. She nodded her head as if in answer to some spoken word.
"Yes, I know. I feel like that, too. That's why I didn't come in before; that's why I'm not really in yet. It catches you by the throat and makes you breathe funny. What is it, Esther?"
"Why—I don't know, Jane. It's loneliness I think—missing Dad."
The child shook her head. But whatever her objection might have been it was beyond her power of expression. She slid off the veranda step and wandered back into the garden. There was another apple in the pocket of her apron, and apples are great comforters.
Left alone, Esther with a resolutely cheerful air took down a blue bowl and proceeded to arrange therein the day's floral offerings. A sweet and crushed mixture they were, pansies, clove-pinks, mignonette, bleeding hearts, bachelors' buttons, all short stemmed and minus any saving touch of green, but true love offerings for all that. Wordless gifts most of them, prim little bunches, hot from tight clasping in chubby hands, shyly and swiftly deposited on "Teacher's desk" when the back of that divinity was turned. The blue bowl took kindly to them all, and as the girl's clever fingers settled and arranged the glowing chaos it seemed that with their crushed fragrance something of the lost spirit of the room came back. Just so had she arranged hundreds of times the sweet smelling miscellanies which had been her father's constant tribute from grateful patients.
She had almost finished when the door opened to admit a little, grey wisp of a woman with a mild white face and large faded eyes which might once have been beautiful. She was dressed entirely in lavender, a fondness for this colour being one of the many harmless fancies born of a brain not quite normal. The rather expressionless face brightened at sight of the girl by the table.
"Why, Esther—I didn't hear you come in. Have you put a mat under the bowl? See now! You have marked the table."
Esther good humouredly reached for a table-mat, for the polish of this particular article of furniture was the pride of Aunt Amy's life. "It's all right, Auntie. It's not really a mark. Look, aren't they sweet? It is like one of father's posies. Is mother any better?"
"The children must think a lot of you, Esther!"
"Yes, although I think they would bring flowers to any one, bless 'em!Is mother—"
"Your mother hasn't been down all day. I went up with her dinner but she didn't take any. She wouldn't answer."
"Auntie, don't you think she ought to do something about these headaches?"
"I don't know, Esther. She'll be all right to-morrow. She always is."
"Yes. But they are getting more frequent, and you know—she is so different. She can't be well. Haven't you noticed it?"
"No," vaguely.
"Well, Jane has. So it can't just be imagination. She ought to consult a doctor."
"She won't."
"But it's absurd! What shall we do if she goes on like this? If there were only some one who would talk to her! She won't listen to me because she is older and married and—all that. All the same she doesn't seem older when she acts like this—like a child!"
"Well, you know, Esther, there isn't any doctor here that your mother just fancies."
The girl stooped lower over the blue bowl, perhaps to hide the little smile which crinkled up the corner of her mouth. The faint colour on her cheek may have been a reflection from the flowers.
"Yes, but haven't you heard? There is a new doctor. He seems quite different—I mean they say he is awfully nice. Mrs. Sykes' Ann was telling me all about him. He is going to board with Mrs. Sykes. The child just worships him already. Perhaps mother might see him."
"I shouldn't worry," said Aunt Amy placidly. "This pepper-grass will be very nice for tea. Did you tell Jane she might have two apples, Esther?"
"No. I told her she might have one. But I don't suppose two will hurt her." Esther was used to Aunt Amy's inconsequences which made impossible the discussion of any subjects save the most trivial. But she sighed a little as she realised anew that there was no help here.
"Jane is feeling badly about Timothy," she explained. "Don't you think we might have tea in here, Auntie? It is so cool."
Aunt Amy, who had been anxiously rubbing an imaginary spot on the table, looked up with a startled air. "Oh, Esther!" she said, in the voice of a frightened child. Then with a child's obvious effort to control rising tears, "Of course, if you say so, Esther. But—but do you feel like risking the round table? Couldn't we have it on the little table in the corner?"
The girl settled the last of her flowers and pushed back her hair with a worried gesture. A pang of mingled irritation and anxiety lent an edge of sharpness to her soft voice.
"Auntie dear! I thought you had quite forgotten that fancy. You know it is only a fancy. Round tables are just like other tables. And you promised me—"
"Yes, I know, but—"
"Well, then, be sensible, dear. We shall have tea in here." Then seeing the real distress on the timid old face, the girl's mood softened. "No, we shan't," she declared gaily. "We'll have it as usual in the dining room. You will fix the pepper-grass and I shall set the table."
But the end of Aunt Amy's vagaries was not yet. She hesitated, flushed and more timidly, yet as one who is compelled, begged for the task of setting the table herself. "For you know, Esther, the sprigged tea-set is so hurt if any one but me arranges it. Yes, of course, it is only a fancy, I know that. But the sprigged tea-set does feel so badly if I neglect it. All the pink in it fades quite out. You must have noticed it, Esther?"
The girl sighed and gave in. Usually Aunt Amy's vagaries troubled her little. Disconcerting at first, they had quickly become a commonplace, for the coming of Aunt Amy to the doctor's household had been too great a blessing to invite criticism. Esther had soon learned to express no surprise when told that the sprigged china had a heart of extreme sensitiveness, and that the third step on the front stair disliked to be trodden upon, and that it was dangerous to sit with one's back to a window facing the east. All these and numberless other strange facts were part of Aunt Amy's twilight world. To her they were immensely important, but to the family the really important thing seemed that, with trifling exceptions, the new inmate of the household was gentle and kind; her housekeeping a miracle and her cooking a dream. In the years she had lived with them there had been but one serious thrill of anxiety, and that came when Dr. Coombe had discovered her endeavouring to infect Jane with her delusions. This had been strictly forbidden and the child's mind, duly warned, was soon safeguarded by her own growing comprehension. Jane quickly understood that it was foolish to shut the garden gate three times every time she came through it, and that no one save Aunt Amy thought it necessary to count all the boards in the sidewalk or to touch all the little posts under the balustrade as one came down stairs. Some of the prettier, more elusive fancies she may have retained, but, if so, they did her no harm.
As for Aunt Amy herself, she lived her shadow-haunted life not unhappily. Dr. Coombe she had worshipped, yet his death had not affected her as much as might have been feared. Perhaps it was one of her compensations that death to her was not quite what it is to the more normal consciousness. It was noticeable that she always spoke of the doctor as if he were in the next room. Her devotion to him had been caused by his success in partially relieving her of the most distressing burden of her disordered brain—the delusion of persecution. Aunt Amy knew that somewhere there existed a mysterious power known vaguely as "They" who sought unceasingly to injure her. Of course it was only once in a while that "They" got a chance, for Aunt Amy was very clever in providing no opportunities. More than once had she outwitted "Them." Still, one must be always upon one's guard! From this harrowing delusion the doctor had done much to deliver her, indeed she had become more normal in every way under his care. It was only now, a year after his death, that Esther imagined sometimes that there was a slipping back—
The ill effects of sitting at a round table, for instance? It was a long time since this particular fancy had been spoken of and Esther had considered it gone altogether. Yet here it was, cropping out again and just at a time when other problems threatened. Things seemed determined to be difficult to-day.
The fact was that Esther was suffering from the need of a confidant. Really worried as she felt about her step-mother's health, the burden of taking any determined action against the wishes of the patient herself was a serious one for a young girl. Yet in whom could she confide? Girl friends she had in plenty but not one whose judgment she could trust before her own. Had the minister been an older man or a man of different calibre she might have gone to him, but the idea of appealing to Mr. Macnair was distasteful. Neither among her father's friends was there one to whom she cared to go for advice concerning her father's widow. They had one and all disapproved, she knew, of the sudden second marriage and Dr. Coombe had never quite forgiven their disapproval.
Often she felt like refusing the responsibility altogether. After all, her step-mother was a woman quite old enough to manage her own affairs. If she wished to foolishly imperil her health why need Esther care? Why indeed? But this train of reasoning never lasted long. Always there came a counter-question, "If you do not care, who will?" And the dearth of any answer settled the burden more firmly upon her rebellious shoulders. For one thing there was always the inner knowledge that Mary Coombe was weak and that she, Esther, was strong. She had always known this. Even when her father had brought home his pretty bride and Esther, a shy, silent child of eleven, had welcomed her, she had known that the newcomer was the weaker spirit. The bride had known it too. She had never attempted to control Esther, leaving the child entirely to her father—a bit of unwitting wisdom which did much to smooth daily life at the Elms. If the doctor saw his wife's weakness of character it is probable that it did not interfere with his love for her. Why need she be strong while he was strong enough for two? But he had forgotten one thing—the day when she would have to be strong alone!
The realisation came to him upon his death-bed. Esther was sure of this. He could not speak, but she had read the message of his eyes, the appeal to the strength in her to help the other's weakness. No getting away from the solemn charge of that entreating look!
* * * * *
Esther was thinking of that look now, as she sat alone in the dusk of the veranda. Tea was over and Aunt Amy was putting Jane to bed. From her mother she had had no word. Blank silence had met her when she had taken the tea tray upstairs and called softly through the closed door. Mrs. Coombe was probably asleep. She would be better to-morrow; but before long she would be ill again, and the interval between the attacks was becoming shorter.
There was anger as well as anxiety in the girl's mind. Her healthy and straightforward youth had little patience with her step-mother's unreasonable caprices. For her illness she had every sympathy, but for the morbid nervousness which seemed to accompany it, none at all. These constant headaches, the increasing nervous irritability from which Mrs. Coombe suffered lay like a shadow over the house. Yet the sufferer refused to take the obvious way of relief and persisted in her refusal with a stubbornness of which no one would have dreamed her light nature capable. Still, willing or unwilling, something must be done. Aunt Amy, too, was becoming more of an anxiety. Once or twice lately she had spoken of "Them," a sign of mental distress which Dr. Coombe had always treated with the utmost seriousness. Perhaps if a doctor were called in for Aunt Amy, Mrs. Coombe would lose her foolish dread of doctors and allow him to prescribe for her also. And if the new doctor were half as clever as Mrs. Sykes said he was—Esther's heart began to warm a little as her fancy pictured such a pleasant solution of all her problems. The little smile curved her lips again as she thought of the maple by the schoolhouse steps, and the lettuce sandwiches and—and everything. She closed her eyes and tried to recall his face as he had looked up at her. Instinctively she knew it for a good face, strong, humorous, kindly, but strong above all. And it was strength that Esther needed. When she went to bed that night her burden seemed a little lighter.
I believe he can help me, she thought, and it isn't as if he were quite a stranger. After all, we had lunch together once!
Undoubtedly Esther slept better that night for the thought of the new doctor. It cannot be said that the doctor slept better because of her. In fact he lay awake thinking of her. He did not want to think of her; he wanted to go to sleep. Twice only had he seen her. Once upon the occasion of the red pump and once when casually passing her on the main street. There was no reason why her white-rose face with its strange blue eyes and its smile-curved lips should float about in the darkness of Mrs. Sykes' best room. Yet there it was. It was the eyes, perhaps. The doctor admitted that they were peculiar eyes, startlingly blue. Dark blue in the shade of the lashes, flashing out light blue fire when the lashes lifted. But Mrs. Sykes' boarder did not want to think about eyes. He wanted to go to sleep. He did not want to think about hair either. Although Miss Coombe had very nice hair—cloudy hair, with little ways of growing about the temple and at the curve of the neck which a blind man could not help noticing. In the peaceful shadows of the room it seemed a still softer shadow framing the vivid girlish face.
Still, on the whole, sleep would have been better company and when at last he did drop off he did not relish being wakened by the voice of Ann at his door.
"Doc-ter, doc-ter! Are you awake? Can I come in?"
"I am not awake. Go away."
Ann's giggle came clearly through the keyhole.
"You've got a visitor," she whispered piercingly through the same medium. "A man. A well man, not a sick one. He came on the train. He came on the milk train—"
"You may come in, Ann." The doctor slipped on his dressing gown with a resigned sigh. "What man and why milk?"
"I don't know. Aunt Sykes kept him on the veranda till she was sure he wasn't an agent. Now he's in the parlour. Aunt hopes you'll hurry, for you never can tell. He may be different from what he looks."
"What does he look?"
Ann's small hands made an expressive gesture which seemed to envisage something long and lean.
"Queer—like that. He's not old, but he's bald. His eyes screw into you.His nose," another formative gesture, "is like that. A nawful big nose.He didn't tell his name."
"If he looks like that, perhaps he hasn't any name. Perhaps he is a button-moulder. In fact I'm almost certain he is—other name Willits. Occupation, professor."
"But if he is a button-maker, he can't be a professor," said Ann shrewdly.
"Oh, yes he can. Button-moulding is what he professes. His line is a specialty in spoiled buttons. He makes them over."
"Second-hand?"
"Better than new."
Ann fidgeted idly with the doctor's cuff-links and then with a flash of her odd childish comprehension, "You love him a lot, don't you?" she said jealously.
The doctor adjusted a collar button.
"England expects that every man shall deny the charge of loving another," he said, "but between you and me, I do rather like old Willits. You see I was rather a worn-out button once and he made me over. Where did you say he was?"
"In the parlour—there's Aunt! She said I wasn't to stay. I'll get it."
Indeed the voice of Mrs. Sykes could be heard on the stairs.
"Ann! Where's that child? Doctor, you'd think that child had never been taught no manners. You'll have to take a firm stand with Ann, Doctor. Land Sakes, I don't want to make her out worse'n she is, but you might as well know that your life won't be worth living if you don't set on Ann."
"All right, Mrs. Sykes. Painful as it may be, I shall do it. Are you sure it's safe to leave a stranger in the parlour?"
Mrs. Sykes looked worried. "I hope to goodness it's all right, Doctor. He's been in the parlour half an hour. I don't think he's an agent, hasn't got a case or a book anywhere. But agents are getting cuter every day. Naturally I didn't like to go so far as to ask his name. And I'm not asking it now. Curiosity was never a fault of mine though I do say it. Still a woman does like to know who's setting in her front parlour."
"And you shall," declared Callandar kindly. "Just hang on a few moments longer, dear Mrs. Sykes, and your non-existent but very justifiable curiosity shall be satisfied."
The parlour at Mrs. Sykes opened to the right of the narrow hall. Its two windows, distinguished by eternally half-drawn blinds of yellow, looked out upon the veranda, permitting a decorous gloom to envelop the sacred precincts. Mrs. Sykes was too careful a housekeeper to take risks with her carpet and too proud of her possessions to care to hide their glories altogether; hence the blinds were never wholly drawn and never raised more than half way. In the yellow gloom, one might feast one's eyes at leisure upon the centre table, draped in red damask, mystic, wonderful, and on its wealth of mathematically arranged books, the Bible, the "Indian Mutiny" and "Water Babies" in blue and gold. This last had been a gift to Ann and was considered by Mrs. Sykes to be the height of foolishness. Still, a book is a book, especially when bound in blue and gold.
Upon the gaily papered walls hung a framed silver name-plate and two pictures. One a gorgeously coloured print of the lamented Queen Victoria in a deep gold frame, and the other a representation of an entrancing allegorical theme entitled "The Two Paths," illustrating the ascent of the saint into heaven and the descent of the sinner into hell. At the top of this picture was the legend, "Which will you choose?"—implying a possible but regrettable lack of taste on the part of the chooser.
Into this abode of the arts and muses came Callandar, alert and smiling. It was hardly his fault that he stumbled over the visitor who, whether in awe or fear of these unveiled splendours, had retreated as far as possible toward the door.
"Don't mind me!" said the visitor meekly.
"Willits! by Jove, I thought it would be you! Say, would you mind not sitting on that chair? It's just glued!"
The visitor arose with conspicuous alacrity. He was a tall man with a domelike head, piercing eyes and formidable nose. Ann's description had been terribly accurate. He observed the tail of his coat carefully and finding no damage, seemed relieved.
"Sit here," said Callandar affably. "And don't expect me to make you welcome, because you aren't. What misfortunate chance has brought you to Coombe?"
"Neither fortune nor chance had anything at all to do with it," declared the visitor. "I followed your luggage. I wanted to see you."
"Well, take a good look."
"I think you can guess why."
"Yes," with a sigh. "I was always a good guesser. And, frankly, Willits,I wish you hadn't."
"I do not doubt it. But, first, is there any other place where we can talk?"
"Don't you like this?" innocently.
The Button-Moulder's look of surprised anguish was sufficient answer.Callandar laughed.
"You always were a bit narrow in your views, Willits. How often have I impressed upon you that beauty depends upon understanding? I don't suppose you have even tried to understand this room? No? Will it help any if I tell you that Mrs. Sykes went without a spring bonnet that she might purchase the deep gold frame which enshrines Victoria the Good, or if I explain that Joseph Sykes, deceased, whose name you see yonder upon that engraved plate, was the most worthless rogue unhung. Yet the silver which displays—"
"Not in the least," interrupted the other hastily. "The place is a nightmare. Nothing can excuse it! And you—how you stand it I cannot see."
"My dear man, I don't stand it. I am not allowed to. It's only upon special occasions that any one is allowed to stand this room. You are a special occasion. But as you seem so unappreciative we can adjourn to my office if you wish."
"You have an office?"
"Certainly. A doctor has to have an office. This way."
Callandar strode across the room and opened a door in the opposite wall. It led into another room, smaller, with no veranda in front of it, yet with a window looking toward the road and two side windows through which the after flush of sunrise streamed. Its door opened upon a small stone stoop set in the grass of the front lawn. The furniture of the room was plain, not to say severe. Cool matting covered the painted floor, hemstitched curtains of linen scrim hung at the windows. There was a businesslike desk, a couch, a reclining chair, a stool by the door; another chair, straight and uncompromising, behind the desk. That was all.
Willits looked around him in a kind of dazed surprise. "Office!" he kept murmuring. "Office!"
"All rather plain, you see," said Callandar regretfully. "But for a beginner with his way to make, not so bad. My patients, three up to date, quite understand and conceal their commiseration with perfect good breeding. Also, the room has natural advantages, it is in the nature of an annex, you see, with a door of its own. Quite cut off from the rest of the house save-for the door by which we entered, the parlour door, which Mrs. Sykes informs me I may lock if I choose although she feels sure that I know her too well to imagine any undue liberties being taken!"
The Button-Moulder with a gesture of despair made as if to sit down upon the nearest chair, but was prevented with kindly firmness by his host.
"Not that chair, please. It may not be quite dry. I glued—"
The voice of the visitor suddenly returned. It was a very dry voice; threadlike, but determined.
"Then if you will kindly find me a chair which you have not glued I shall sit down and dispose of a few burning thoughts. Callandar, as soon as you have finished playing the fool—"
"Consider it finished, old man."
"Then what does this, all this"—with a sweeping hand wave—"mean? You cannot seriously intend to stay here?"
"Why not?"
"Your question is absurd."
"No, it isn't. Let it sink in. Why should I not stay here? Examine the facts. I am ordered change, rest, interest, good air—a year at least must elapse before I take up my life again. I must spend that year somewhere. Why not here? It is healthy, high, piney, quiet. I had become utterly tired of my tramping tour. All the good I can get from it I have got. Chance, or whatever you like to call it, leads me to this place. A place which needs a doctor and which this particular doctor needs. There is nothing absurd about it."
The tall man observed his friend in interested silence. Apparently he required time to adjust his mind to the fact that Callandar was in earnest. The badinage he brushed aside.
"Then you really intend—but how about this office? If it is not a torn-fool office, where does the necessary rest come in?"
"Rest doesn't mean idleness. I should die of loafing. As a matter of fact since coming here I have rested as I have not rested for a year. Look at me! Can't you see it? Or is the renovation not yet visible to the naked eye? Great Scott! I don't need to vegetate in order to rest, do I?"
"No." Another pause ensued during which the gimlet eyes of the professor were busy. Then he seemed suddenly to leap to the heart of the matter.
"And—Lorna?" He asked crisply.
It was the other's turn to be silent. He flushed, looked embarrassed, and drummed with his fingers upon the table.
"Of course I have no right to ask," added Willits primly.
"Yes, you have, old man. Every right. But I knew you had come to ask that question and I didn't like it. The answer is not a flattering one—to me. Nor is it what you expected. To be brief, Lorna won't have me. Refused me—flat!"
Blank surprise portrayed itself upon the professor's face.
"The devil she did!"
"Confess now!" said Callandar, smiling. "You thought I was the one to blame? There was retributive justice in your eye, don't deny it!"
"But, I don't understand! I thought—I was sure—"
"I know. But she doesn't! Not in that way. As a sister—"
"That's enough! I—Accept my apology. I feel very sorry, Henry."
Again that look of embarrassment and guilt upon the doctor's face.
"No. Don't feel sorry! See here, let's be frank about the whole thing. It was a mistake, from the very beginning, a mistake. Miss Sinnet, Lorna, is a girl in a thousand. But—I did not care for her as a man should care for the woman he makes his wife. Nor did she care for me—wait, I'm not denying that there was a chance. We were very congenial. She might have cared if—if I had cared more greatly."
"Henry Callandar! Are you a cad?"
"No. Merely a man speaking the exact truth. I thought I might risk it, with you. Lorna Sinnet is not a woman to give her love and take a half-love in return. She was more clear-sighted than you or I. We should both have been very miserable."
Elliott Willits sighed. He was a very sensible man. He prided himself upon being devoid of sentiment, but even the most sensible of men, entirely devoid of sentiment, do not like to see their well laid plans go wrong.
"Well," he said, "I was mistaken. Let us say no more about it."
Callandar's eyes softened, melted into misty grey. He laid his arm affectionately over the other's thin shoulders. "Only this," he said. "That no man ever had a better friend! I know you, old Button-Moulder. I know your ambition to make of me a 'shining button on the vest of the world!' You thought that Lorna might help. But I failed you there. I'm sorry. That was really the bitterness of the whole thing—-to fail you!"
"You owe me nothing," gruffly.
"Only my life—my sanity."
"I shall doubt the latter if you stay here."
"No, you will see it triumphantly vindicated. I tell you I am better already. Look at my hand! Do you remember how it shook the last time I held it out for you. A few more months of this and it will be steady as a rock. Ah! it's good to be feeling fit again! And it isn't only a physical improvement." His smile faded and rising he began to pace the room. "I doubt if even you fully understand the mental depression that was dragging me down. No wonder Lorna would have none of me! Strange, that I cannot understand my own case as I understand the cases of others. Do what I would, I could not heal myself, the soul of the matter persistently escaped me. I was beginning to be as much the victim of an obsession as any of the poor creatures whom I tried to cure."
"You never told me of that."
"No, I was afraid to speak of it. It would have made it seem more real.But I can tell you now, if you are sure you will not be bored."
"I shall not be bored," said Willits quietly.
"In order to make you understand, I'll have to go back," said the doctor musingly, "a long way back. Some of the story you already know, but now I want you to know it all. But first—when you found me in that hospital, a useless bit of human wreckage, and forced me back into life with your scorn of a coward and your cutting words, what did you think? What did I tell you? It is all hazy to me."
"You told me very little. It was plain enough. You had come a bad cropper. Some girl, I gathered. You had lost her, you blamed yourself. You talked a great deal of nonsense. I inferred—the usual thing!"
"You were mistaken. It was at once better and worse than that. But let's begin at the beginning. My father was a fairly wealthy man—but a dreamer. He made his money by a clever invention and lost it by an investment little short of idiotic. Like many unpractical men he had rather fancied himself as a man of business and the disillusion killed him. He—shot himself. My mother, my sister and myself were left, with nothing save a small sum in the bank and the deed of the modest house we lived in. Adela was twenty-one and I was nineteen. We sold the house, moved into rooms; Adela learned shorthand and went into an office. I wanted to do the same. But mother was adamant. I must finish my college course and take my degree; she and Adela could manage until I could make it up to them later. It was hard, but it seemed the only sensible thing to do—
"I faced the task of working my way through college with a thankful heart, for though I pretended that I did not care, it would have been a terrible thing to have given up my life's ambition. The thought of Adela trudging to the office hurt—it was the touch of the spur. I needn't tell you, you can guess how I worked! People were kind. One summer, old Doctor Inglis, whose amiable hobby it was to help young medical students, engaged me for the holidays as his chauffeur and general helper at a wage which would see me through my next term. It seemed an unusual piece of luck, for he lived only twenty miles from my mother's home and an electric tram connected the towns. One night I went with Adela to a Church Social—of all places—and that is where the story really begins, for it was at the Social that I met Molly Weston. It seemed the most casual of all accidents, for you can imagine that I did not frequent churches in those days, and Molly, too, had come there by chance. She was dressed in pink, her cheeks were pink, she wore a pink rose in her hair. She was the prettiest little fairy that ever smiled and pouted her way into a boy's heart. Before I left her I was madly in love—a boy's first headlong passion. Adela was amazed, teased me in her elderly sister way but never for a moment took it seriously. Molly was a mere bird of passage, an American girl staying with friends for a brief time, therefore my infatuation was a humorous thing. But it was not so simple as that. Molly stayed on, Dr. Inglis was indulgent, we met continually. If her friends knew of it they did not care. It was just a flirtation of their pretty guest's. As a serious factor I was quite beneath the horizon, a young fellow working his way through college, and with, later on, a mother and sister to support.
"Molly understood the situation. At least she knew all the facts. I doubt if she ever understood them. She was one of those helpless, clinging girls who never seem to understand anything clearly. I remember well how I used to agonise in explanation, trying to make her see our difficulties and to face them with me. But when I had talked myself into helpless silence she would ruffle my hair and say, 'But you really do love me, don't you, Harry?' or 'I don't care what we have to do, so long as mother doesn't know.'
"I soon found out that her one strong emotion was fear of her mother. She was fond of her but she feared her as weak natures fear the strong, especially when bound to them by ties of blood. I was allowed to see her photograph—the picture of a grim hard face instinct with an almost terrible strength. No wonder my pretty Molly was her slave. One would have deemed it impossible that they were mother and daughter. Molly, it appears, was like her father, and he, poor man, had been long dead. Molly would do anything, promise anything, if only her mother might not know. She had not the faintest scruple in deceiving her, but this I laid, and still lay, to the strength of her love for me.
"She did love me. She must have loved me—else how could her timid nature have taken the risk it did?
"Summer fled by like a flash. Molly stayed with her friends as long as she could find an excuse and then went on for a brief week in Toronto. It was the week, of course, that I returned to college. We hoped that she could extend her stay, but her mother wrote 'Come home,' and there was no appeal from that. Then I did a desperate thing. Without Molly's knowledge I wrote to her mother telling her that I loved her daughter and begging, as a man begs for his life, to be allowed to ask her to wait for me. The letter was a lie in that it concealed the fact that my love was already confessed but I felt it necessary to shield Molly. I received no answer to the letter, but Molly received a telegram, 'Come home at once.'
"I can leave you to imagine the scene—my despair, Molly's tears! Never for an instant did she dream of disobeying and I—I felt that if she went I should lose her forever.
"Willits, there is something in me, devil or angel, which will not give up. Nothing has ever conquered it yet and Molly was like wax in my hands—so long as 'Mother' need not know. I do not attempt to excuse myself; what I did was dastardly, but it did not seem so then. The night before she left, she stole away from home. I had a license and we were married by a Methodist minister. He knew neither of us and probably forgot the whole incident immediately. It was a marriage only in name for we said good-bye at Molly's door. She left next morning. I never saw her again."
Into the silence which followed, the professor's words dropped dryly.
"What was your idea in forcing a meaningless marriage?"
"I loved her. I knew that it was the only way. Madly as I loved her, I knew that Molly was weak as water. I could not, would not, run the risk of letting her leave me without the legal tie. But I justified it to myself—I could have justified anything, I fear! I vowed a vow that she would be repaid for the waiting as never woman yet was paid. She wept on my shoulder and said, 'And you really do love me, Harry—and you'll swear mother need never know?'
"I swore it. There were to be no letters. Molly was too terrified to write and still more terrified of receiving a letter. She would live in constant dread, she said, if there were a possibility of such a thing. Weak in everything else she was adamant in this.
"I went back to work. I worked with the strength of ten. Health, comfort, pleasure, all were subordinated to the fever of work. I hoped that I might steal a glimpse of her sometimes. She promised to try to return to Toronto. But my letter must have alarmed the mother. I found out, indirectly, that shortly after her return, Mrs. Weston whisked her off to Europe. They were gone a year. When they returned I was in the far west with a government surveying party, earning something to help me with my last year's college expenses. When I was again in Toronto she had vanished. Gone, as I afterward learned, to stay with an aunt in California. Her mother, alive to danger, was not going to risk a meeting, and my vow to Molly left me helpless. But how I worked!
"That last year things began to come my way. Adela married a fine young fellow, wealthy and generous. My mother went to live with them in their western home, Calgary, where they still are. Then Thomas Callandar, my mother's brother, who had never bothered about any of us living, died, and left me a handsome property, adding, as you already know, the condition that I take the family name. You remember that my father's name, the name under which I married Molly, was Chedridge.
"Nothing now held me from Molly—in another month I would have my degree, and free and rich I could go to claim her. It seemed like a fairy tale! In my great happiness I broke my promise and wrote to her, to the California address, hoping to catch her there. In three weeks' time the letter came back from the dead letter office. I wrote again, this time to the Cleveland address, a short note only, telling her I was free at last. Then, next day, I followed the letter to Cleveland, wealth in one hand, the assurance of an honourable degree in the other.
"I had no trouble in finding the house. It was one of a row of houses, nondescript but comfortable, in a pleasant street. It seemed familiar—I had seen Molly's snapshots of it often. I cannot tell you what it felt like to be really there—to walk down the street, up the path, up the steps to the veranda. I was trembling as with ague, I was chalk-white I knew—was I not in another moment to see my wife!
"I could hear the electric bell tingle somewhere inside. Then an awful pause. What if they were not at home? What if they lived there no longer? I knew with a pang of fear that I could not bear another disappointment.
"There was a sound in the hall, the door knob moved—the door opened. I gasped in the greatness of my relief for the face in the opening was undoubtedly the face of Molly's mother. They were at home. They must have had my letter—they must be expecting me—
"Something in the woman's face daunted me. It was deathly and strained. Surely she did not intend to continue her opposition? Yet it confused me. I forgot all that I had intended to say, I stammered:
"'I am Henry Chedridge. I want to see Molly. I am rich, I have my degree—'
"'You cannot see her!' she said. Just that! The door began to close. But I had myself in hand now. I laid hold of the door and spoke in a different tone. The tone of a master.
"'This is foolish, Mrs. Weston. I thought you understood. I can and I will see your daughter. Molly is my wife!'
"She gave way at that. The door opened wide, showing a long empty hall. The woman stood aside, made no effort to stop me, but looking me in the eyes she said: 'You come too late. Your wife is not here. Molly is dead!'
"Then, in one second, it seemed that all the years of overwork, of mental strain and bodily deprivation rose up and took their due. I tried to speak, stuttered foolishly, and fell like dead over the door-sill of the house I was never to enter.
"You know the rest, for you saved me. When I struggled back to life, without the will to live, you shamed and stung me into effort. You brought the new master-influence into my life, taught me that the old ambition, the old work-ardour was not dead. Those months with you in Paris, in Germany, in London at the feet of great men saw a veritable new birth. I ceased to be Henry Chedridge, lover, and became Henry Callandar, scientist. All this I owe to you."
The other raised his hand.
"No, not that. Some impulse I may have given you, but you have made yourself what you are. But—you have not told me all yet?"
"No." Again the doctor began his uneasy pacing of the room. "The rest is harder to tell. It is not so clear. It has nothing to do with facts at all. It is just that when I first began to show signs of overwork this last time I became troubled with an idea, an obsession. It had no foundation. It persisted without reason. It was fast becoming unbearable!"
He paused in his restless pacing and Willits' keen eyes noticed the look of strain which had aroused his alarm some months ago. Nevertheless he asked in his most matter-of-fact tone, "And the idea was—?"
Callandar hesitated. "I can hardly speak of it yet in the past tense.The idea is—that Molly is not dead!"
"Good Heavens!" ejaculated the professor, startled out of his calm. "But have you any reason to doubt? To—to base—"
"None whatever. No enquiries which I have made cast doubt upon the mother's words. But on the other hand I have been unable to confirm them. I cannot find where my wife died—except that there is no record of her death in the Cleveland registries. She did not die in Cleveland."
"But you have told me that they were seldom at home. That the mother was a great traveller."
"Yes. The want of evidence in Cleveland proves nothing."
"Did you feel any doubt at first?"
"Absolutely none. The gloomy house, the empty hall, the white face and black dress of the woman in the door, the look of horror and anger in her eyes—yes, and a kind of grim triumph too—all served to drive the fatal message home. Dead!—There was death in the air of that house, death in the ghastly face—in the cruel, toneless words!—After my tedious recovery I made an effort to see Mrs. Weston, although I had conceived a horror of the woman, but she was gone. The house had been sold. I tried to trace her without result. She seemed to have vanished off the face of the earth."
"And how long ago did the whole thing happen?"
"Twelve years. I was twenty-three when I went to claim my bride. I am thirty-five now."
"Dear me!" said the little man sincerely, "I have always thought you older than that! But twelve years is—twelve years! And you say this doubt is a very recent thing?"
"Yes. I have told you the thing is absurd. But I can't help it."
"Have you made any further enquiries?"
"Yes, uselessly. There is a rumour that Mrs. Weston, too, is dead. A lady who used to know them tells me that she is certain she heard of her death—in England, she thinks, but upon being questioned was quite at sea as to where or when or even as to the original source of her information. She remembers 'hearing it' and that's all. Then I sought for the aunts, the maiden ladies whom Molly visited in California. They too are gone, the older died during the time I lay ill in the hospital. The younger one was not quite bright, I believe, and was taken away to live with some relatives in the East. It was not Molly's mother who fetched her. It was a man, a very kind man whom the old lady, my informant, had never seen before. She said he had a queer name. She could not remember it, but thought he was a physician. I imagine that the kind friend was an asylum doctor."
"Very likely. And could your informant tell you nothing of the niece—ifMolly had visited there?"
"She remembered her last visit very well but her memories were of no value. She was a sweet, pretty child, she said, and she often wondered how she came to have such a homely mother. She evidently disliked Mrs. Weston very much, and when I asked her if she had ever heard of Molly's death she said no, but that she was not a bit surprised as she had always predicted that the pretty, little, white thing would be worried into an early grave. I noticed the word 'white' and asked her about it, for the Molly I knew had a lovely colour. Her memory became confused when I pressed her, but she seemed quite sure that the girl who came that winter with her mother was a very pale girl—looked as if she might have come south for her health."
"All of which goes to prove—"
"Yes—I know. Poor Molly! Poor little girl! I believe in my heart that our mad marriage killed her. Without me constantly with her, the fear of her mother, perhaps the doubt of me, the burden of the whole disastrous secret was too much. And it was my fault, Willits—all my fault!" He turned to the window to hide his working face. "Do you wonder," he added softly, "that her poor little wraith comes back to trouble me?"
"Come, come, no need to be morbid! You made a mistake, but you have paid. As for the doubt which troubles you—it is but the figment of a tired brain. The mother could have had no possible reason for deceiving you. You were no longer an ineligible student—and the girl loved you. Besides, there was the legal tie. Would any woman condemn her daughter to a false position for life? And without reason? The idea is preposterous. Come now, admit it!"
"Oh, I admit it! My reasoning powers are still unimpaired. But reason has nothing to do with that kind of mental torture. It is my soul that has been sick; it is my soul that must be cured. And to come back to the very point from which we started, I believe I shall find that cure here—in Coombe."
"With Mrs. Sykes?" dryly.
"Certainly. Mrs. Sykes is part of the cure."
"And the other part?"
"Oh—just everything. I hardly know why I like the place. But I do. Why analyse? I can sleep here. I wake in the morning like a man with the right to live, and for the first time in a year, Willits, a long torturing year, I am beginning to feel free of that oppression, that haunting sense that somewhere Molly is alive, that she needs me and that I cannot get to her. I had begun to fear that it would drive me mad. But, here, it is going. Yesterday I was walking down a country road and suddenly I felt free—exquisitely, gloriously free—the past wiped out! That—that was why I almost feared to see you, Elliott, you bring the past so close."
The hands of the friends met in a firm handclasp.
"Have it your own way," said the professor, smiling his grim smile."Consider me silenced."
The doctor's answer was cut off by the jingling entrance of Mrs. Sykes bearing before her a large tray upon which stood tall glasses, a beaded pitcher of ice cold lemonade and some cake with white frosting.
"Seeing as it's so hot," said she amiably, "I thought a cold drink might cool you off some. Especially as breakfast will be five minutes late owing to the chicken. I thought maybe as you had a friend, doctor, a chicken—"
"A chicken will be delicious," said the doctor, answering the question in her voice. "Mrs. Sykes, let me present Professor Willits; Willits, Mrs. Sykes! Let me take the tray."
Mrs. Sykes shook hands cordially. "Land sakes!" she said. "I thought you were a priest! Not that I really suspicioned that the doctor, good Presbyterian as he is, would know any such. But priests is terrible wily. They deceive the very elect—and it's best to be prepared. As it is, any friend of the doctor's is a friend of mine. You're kindly welcome, I'm sure."
"Thank you," said the professor limply.
The doctor handed them each a glass and raised his own.
"Let us drink," he said, "to Coombe. 'Coombe and the Soul cure!'"
"Amen!" said Willits.
"Land sakes!" said Mrs. Sykes. "I thought it was his spine!"
Zerubbabel Burk sat upon his stool of office in the doctor's consulting room, swinging his legs. Would-be discoverers of perpetual motion might have received many hints from Bubble, though he himself would have scorned to consider the swinging of legs as motion. He was under the delusion that he was sitting perfectly still. For the doctor was asleep.
Asleep, at four o'clock on a glorious summer day! No wonder his friend and partner wore a tragic face.
"Doesn't seem to care a hang if he never gets any patients!" mused Bubble, resentfully, stealing a half fond, half angry glance at the placid face of the sleeper. "Only two folks in all day and one a kid with a pin in its throat. And all he says is, 'Don't worry, son, we're getting on fine!' We'll go smash one of these days, that's what we'll do—just smash!"
"Tap-tap" sounded the blinds which were drawn over the western windows. A pleasant little breeze was trying to come in. "Buzz" sounded a fly on the wall. Bubble arose noisily and killed it with a resounding "thwack."
"Wake the doctor, would you?" he said. "Take that!"
But even the pistol-like report which accompanied the fly's demise failed to ruffle the sleeper. Bubble returned disconsolate to his stool.
"Smash," he repeated, "smash is the word. I see our finish."
The pronoun which Bubble used nowadays was always "we." He belonged to the doctor body and soul, but it was no servile giving. The doctor also belonged to him, and it was with this privilege of ownership that he now found fault with his idol. Had any one else objected to the doctor's afternoon rest he would have found reason and excuse enough; but in his own heart he was puzzled. Such indifference to the appearances, such wilful disregard of "business" could hardly, he thought, be real; yet, for an imitation, it was remarkably well done. Bubble admired even while he deprecated.
Why, he did not even go to church so that the minister might introduce him around as "Dr. Callandar, the new brother who has come amongst us." Neither did he walk down Main Street, nor show himself in public places. When he went walking he went early in the morning and directed his steps toward the country. About all the usual means of harmless and necessary advertising he did not seem to know Beans! Bubble looked disconsolately out of the window. There was Ann, now, coming across the yard. School must be out, and still the doctor slept.
"Anybody in?" asked Ann in a stage whisper.
"Not just now. Been very busy though. Doctor's resting. Stop that noise."
"I'm not making any noise! He's part my doctor anyway. I'll make a noise if I like—"
"No you won't, miss!"
"But I don'tlike," added Ann with her impish smile. "If he's asleep what are you staying here for? Come on out."
Bubble regarded the tempter with scornful amazement.
"That's it!" he exclaimed, "jest like I always said, women haven't any sense of honour. What d'ye suppose I'm here for?"
"Not just to swing your legs," placidly. "He doesn't need you when he's asleep, does he? Come on and let's get some water-cress. He'd like some for his tea—dinner I mean. Say, Bubble, why does he call it dinner?"
"Because he comes from the city, Silly! They don't have any tea in the city. They have breakfast when they get up and lunch at noon and dinner about seven or eight or nine at night. Then if they get hungry before bed-time they have supper. The doctor says he never gets hungry after dinner so he don't have that."
Ann considered this a moment.
"They do so have tea!" she declared. "I heard Mrs. Andrew West telling about it. She said her sister in Toronto had a tea specially for her."
"Oh," with superb disdain, "that's just for women. If they can't wait for dinner they get bread and butter and tea in the afternoon. But they have to eat it walking around and they only get it when they go out to call."
Ann sighed. "I'd like to live in the city," she murmured. "Say, don't you feel as if you'd like a cookie right now?"
Bubble squirmed. But his Spartan fortitude held.
"In business hours? No, thank you. 'Tisn't professional. Look silly, wouldn't I, if one of our patients caught me eating?"
"How many to-day?"
"That'd be telling. 'Tisn't professional to tell. Doctor says if a man wants to succeed, he's got to be as dumb as a noyster in business!"
"Pshaw!" said Ann, "Aunty'll tell. She always counts. Then you don't want a cookie?"
"Well—later on—Cricky! here's some one coming! You scoot—pike it!"
"I won't!" Ann stood her ground, peering eagerly around the rose bush. "It's only Esther Coombe. She'll be coming to see Aunt—no—she's coming here! Hi, Bubble, wake him up—quick!"
"Hum, Hum!" said Bubble in a loud voice, rattling a chair. The sleeper made no movement.
Ann, brave through anxiety, flew across the room and shook him with all the strength of her small hands. The heavy lids lifted and still Ann shook.
"Is it an earthquake?" asked the victim politely.
"No—it's a patient! Oh, do get up. Oh, goodness gracious, look at your hair!"
The doctor passed his hand absently over a disordered head. "Yes," he said, "I have always thought that shaking is not good for hair. Dear me! I believe I have been asleep!"
Ann threw him a glance of mingled admiration and reproach and vanished through the parlour door just as the step of the patient sounded upon the stone steps.
"Why, Bubble Burk!" said a voice. "What are you doing here?"
At the sound of the voice, sleep fled from the doctor's eyes. He arose precipitately.
"I'm workin'," Bubble's voice was not as confident as usual. "This here is Dr. Callandar's office. Mrs. Sykes' visitors go round to the front door."
"Oh! But it's the doctor I wish to see. Is he in?"
Bubble was now plainly agitated.
"If you'll just wait a moment, I'll—I'll see."
Leaving Esther smiling upon the steps he disappeared into the shaded office and pulled up the blinds. The couch had been decorously straightened. The office was empty! Bubble gave a sigh of relief and his professional manner returned.
"He isn't just what you might call in," he explained affably to Esther."But he'll be down directly. Walk in."
Esther walked in and took the seat which Bubble indicated.
"Somebody sick over at your house?" with ill-concealed hope.
Esther dimpled. "Not dangerously, thank you."
"Then it's just tickets for the choir concert. I might have known. But you're too late. Doctor's got half a dozen already. He—"
Further revelations were cut short by the entrance of the doctor himself. A doctor with sleep-cleared eyes, fresh collar, and newly brushed hair. A doctor who shook hands with his caller in a manner which even the professional Bubble felt to be irreproachable.
"Bubble, you may go."
With a grin of satisfied pride the junior partner departed, but once outside the gloomy expression returned.
"It's only choir-tickets!" he told Ann, who was waiting around the corner of the house. "Come on—let's go fishin'."
Inside the office Esther and the doctor looked at each other and smiled. He, because he felt like smiling; she, because she felt nervous. Yet it was not going to be as awkward as she had feared. With a decided sense of relief she realised that Dr. Callandar looked exactly like a doctor after all! Convention, even in clothes, has a calming effect. There was little of the weary tramp who had quenched his throat at the school pump in the well groomed and quietly capable looking doctor. With a notable decrease of tension Esther saw that the man before her was a stranger, a pleasant, professional stranger, with whom no embarrassment was possible.
As for him he realised nothing except that Coombe was really a delightful place. He felt glad that he had stayed.
"No one ill, I hope, Miss Coombe?" His tone, even, seemed to have lost the whimsical inflection of the tramp.
"No, Doctor. Not ill exactly. It is Aunt Amy. We cannot understand just what is the matter. You see, Aunty imagines things. She is not quite like other people. Perhaps," with a quick smile as she thought of Mrs. Sykes, "perhaps you may have heard of her—of her fantastic ideas? They are really quite harmless and apart from them she is the most sensible person I know. But lately, just the other day, something happened—"
He checked her with an almost imperceptible gesture. "Could you tell me about it from the beginning?"
Esther looked troubled. "I do not know much about the beginning. You see, Aunt Amy is my step-mother's aunt, and I have only known her since she came to live with us shortly after my father's second marriage. But I know that she has been subject to delusions since she was a young girl. She was to have been married and on the wedding day her lover became ill with scarlet fever, a most malignant type. She also sickened with it a little later; it killed him and left her mentally twisted—as she is now. Her health is good and the—strangeness—is not very noticeable. It has usually to do with unimportant things. She is really," with a little burst of enthusiasm, "a Perfect Dear!"
The doctor smiled. "And the new development?"
"It is not exactly new. She has always had one delusion more serious than the others. She believes that she has enemies somewhere who would do her harm if they got the chance. She is quite vague as to who or what they are. She refers to them as 'They.' Once, when she came to us first, she was frightened of poison and, although my father, who had great influence over her, seemed to cure her of any active fear, for years she has persisted in a curious habit of drinking her coffee without setting down the cup. The idea seemed to be that if she let it out of her hands 'They,' the mysterious persecutors, might avail themselves of the opportunity to drug it. Does it sound too fantastic?"
"No. It is not unusual—a fairly common delusion, in fact. There is a distinct type of brain trouble, one of whose symptoms is a conviction of persecution. The results are fantastic to a degree."
Well, the day before yesterday Aunt Amy was drinking her coffee as usual, when she heard Jane scream in the garden. She is very fond of Jane, and it startled her so that she jumped up at once, forgetting all about the coffee, and ran out to see what was the matter. Jane had cut her finger and the tiniest scratch upsets poor Auntie terribly. She is terrified of blood. When she came back she felt faint and at once picked up the cup and drank the remaining coffee. I hoped she had not noticed the slip but she must have done so, subconsciously, for when I was helping her with the dishes she turned suddenly white—ghastly. She had just remembered!
'They've got me at last, Esther!' she said with a kind of proud despair. 'I've been pretty smart, but not quite smart enough.'
I pretended not to understand and she explained quite seriously that while she had been absent in the garden 'They' had seen her half-filled cup and seized their opportunity. It was quite useless to point out that there was no one in the house but ourselves. She only said, 'Oh, "They" would not let me see them "They" are too smart for that.' Overwhelming smartness is one of the attributes of the mysterious 'They.'
"I hoped that the idea would wear away but it didn't; it strengthened. In vain I pointed out that she was perfectly well, with no symptom of poisoning. She merely answered that naturally 'They' would be too smart to use ordinary poisons with symptoms. 'I shall just grow weaker and weaker,' she said, 'and in a week or a month I shall die!' I tried to laugh but I was frightened. Mother advised taking no notice at all and I have tried not to, but I can't keep it up. She is certainly weaker and so strange and hopeless. I am terrified. Can mind really affect matter, Doctor Callandar?"
"No. As a scientific fact, it cannot. But it is true that certain states of mind and certain conditions of matter always correspond. Why this is so, no one knows, when we do know we shall hold the key to many mysteries. The understanding, even partial, of this correspondence will be a long step in a long new road. Meanwhile we speak loosely of mind influencing matter, ignoring the impossibility. And, however it happens, it is undoubtedly true that if we can, by mental suggestion, influence your Aunt's mind into a more healthy attitude the corresponding change will take place physically."
"But I have tried to reason with her."
"You can't reason with her. She is beyond mere reason. I might as well try to reason you out of your conviction that the sun is shining. A delusion like hers has all the stability of a perfectly sane belief."
"Then what can we do?"
"Since that delusion is a fact for her we must treat it as if it were a fact for us."
"You mean we must pretend to believe that the danger is real?"
"It is real. People have died before now of nothing save a fixed idea of death."
"Oh!"
"But don't worry. Aunt Amy is not going to die. When may I see her? If I come over in a half an hour will that be convenient?"
Esther rose with relief. How kind he had been! How completely he had understood! She had been right, perfectly right, in coming to him. In spite of Mrs. Coombe's ridicule, Aunt Amy's need had been no fancy. And there was another thing; he was coming to the house. Her mother would see him—and presto! her prejudice against doctors would vanish—he would cure the headaches, and everything would be happy again.
The doctor, watching keenly, thought that she must have been troubled greatly to show such evident relief.
"One thing more," he said. "Was there, do you know, any history of insanity in your aunt's family?"
The girl paled. The idea was a disturbing one.
"Why—no—I think not. I never heard. You see, she is not my Aunt, really, but my step-mother's aunt. There was a brother, I think, who died in—in an institution. He was not quite responsible, but in his case it was drink. That is different, isn't it? Does it make any difference?"
"No—only it may help me to understand the case. Good-afternoon."
He watched her go, through a peep-hole made by Bubble in the blind.
"Pretty, isn't she?" said a reflective voice below him.
The doctor started. But it was only Mrs. Sykes who had stepped around the house corner to pluck some flowers from the bed beneath the window. As he did not answer, the voice continued, "That boy Burk has gone fishing. I told you you'd regret putting that new suit on to him, brass buttons and all! Not that I want to say anything against the lad and his mother a widow, but when a person's dealing with a limb of mischief a person ought to know what to expect. Anybody sick over at Esther's house?"