But though Dr. Burnet had been ’umble about his position at Steephill,
and considered himself only as the physician of the servants’ hall, he
was not invariably left in that secondary position. On this particular
snowy evening, when master and horse and man were all eager to get home
in view of the drifting of the snow, which was already very deep, and
the darkness of the night, which made it dangerous, Lady Jane--who was
alone at Steephill, i.e. without any house party, and enjoying the sole
society of Sir John, her spouse, which was not lively--bethought herself
that she would like to consult the doctor. She did not pretend that she
had more than a cold, but then a cold may develop into anything, as all
the world knows. It was better to have a talk with Dr. Burnet than not
to say a word to anybody, and to speak of her cold rather than not to
speak at all. Besides, she did want to hear something of old Tredgold,
and whether Katherine was behaving well, and what chance there might be
for Stella. The point of behaviour in Katherine about which Lady Jane
was anxious was whether or not she was keeping her sister’s claims
before her father--her conduct in other respects was a matter of
absolute indifference to her former patroness.
“I have not been in Sliplin for quite a long time,” she said. “It may be
a deficiency in me, but, you know, I don’t very much affect your
village, Dr. Burnet.”
“No; few people do; unless they want it, or something in it,” the doctor
said as he made out his prescription, of which I think _eau sucrée_, or
something like it, was the chief ingredient.
“I don’t know what I should want in it or with it,” said Lady Jane with
a touch of impatience. And then she added, modifying her tone, “Tell me
about the Tredgolds, Dr. Burnet. How is the old man? Not a very
satisfactory patient, I should think--so fond of his own way; especially
when you have not Stella at hand to make him amenable.”
“He is not a bad patient,” said Dr. Burnet. “He does not like his own
way better than most old men. He allows himself to be taken good care of
on the whole.”
“Oh, I am glad to hear so good an opinion of him. I thought he was very
headstrong. Now, you know, I don’t want you to betray your patient’s
secrets, Dr. Burnet.”
“No,” he said; “and it wouldn’t matter, I fear, if you did,” he
continued after a pause; “but I know no secrets of the Tredgolds, so I
am perfectly safe----”
“That’s rather rude,” said Lady Jane, “but of course it’s the right
thing to say; and of course also you know all about Stella and her
elopement and the dreadful disappointment. I confess, for my own part, I
did not think he could stand out against her for a day.”
“He is a man who knows his own mind very clearly, Lady Jane.”
“So it appears. And will he hold out, do you think, till the bitter end?
Can Katherine do nothing? Couldn’t she do something if she were to try?
I mean for those poor Somers--they are great friends of mine. He is, you
know, a kind of relation. And poor Stella! Do tell me, Dr. Burnet, do
you think there is no hope? Couldn’t you do something yourself? A doctor
at a man’s bedside has great power.”
“It is not a power I would ever care to exercise,” Dr. Burnet said.
“Oh, you are too scrupulous! And when you consider how poor they are,
doctor!--really badly off. Why, they have next to nothing! The pay, of
course, is doubled in India, but beyond that---- Think of Charlie Somers
living on his pay! And then there is, Stella the most expensive little
person, accustomed to every luxury you can think of, and never used to
deny herself anything. It is extremely hard lines for them, certain as
they were that her father---- Oh, I can’t help thinking, Dr. Burnet,
that Katherine could do something if she chose.”
“Then you may be quite at ease, Lady Jane, for I am sure she will
choose--to do a hardness to anyone, let alone her sister----”
“Ah, Dr. Burnet,” cried Lady Jane, shaking her head, “it is so difficult
to tell in what subtle forms self-interest will get in. Now there is one
thing that I wish I could see as a way of settling the matter. I should
like to see Katherine Tredgold married to some excellent, honourable
man. Oh, I am not without sources of information. I have heard a little
bird here and there. What a good thing if there was such a man, who
would do poor little Stella justice and give her her share! Half of Mr.
Tredgold’s fortune would be a very handsome fortune. It would make all
the difference to--say, a rising professional man.”
Dr. Burnet pretended to make a little change in the prescription he had
been writing. His head was bent over the writing-table, which was an
advantage.
“I have no doubt half of Mr. Tredgold’s fortune would be very nice to
have,” he said, “but unfortunately Miss Katherine is not married, nor do
I know who are the candidates for her hand.”
“I assure you,” said Lady Jane, “if there was such a person I should
take care to do everything I could to further his views. I have not seen
much of Katherine lately, but I should make a point of asking her and
him to meet here. There is nothing I would not do to bring such a thing
about, and--and secure her happiness, you know. You will scarcely
believe it, but it is the truth, that Katherine was always the one I
liked best.”
What a delightful, satisfactory, successful lie one can sometimes tell
by telling the truth. Dr. Burnet, who loved Katherine Tredgold, was
touched by this last speech--there was the ring of sincerity in the
words; and though Lady Jane had not in the least the welfare of
Katherine in her head at this moment, still, these words were
undoubtedly true.
He sat for some time making marks with the pen on the paper before him,
and Lady Jane was so much interested in his reply that she did not press
for it, but sat quite still, letting him take his time.
“Have you any idea,” he said, making as though he were about to alter
the prescription for the third time, “on what ground Mr. Tredgold
refused Sir Charles Somers, who was not ineligible as marriages go?” His
extreme coolness, and the slight respect with which he spoke had a quite
subduing influence upon Lady Jane. “Was it--for his private character,
perhaps?”
“Nothing of the sort,” cried Lady Jane. “Do you know Charlie Somers is a
cousin of mine, Dr. Burnet?”
“That,” said the doctor, “though an inestimable advantage, would not
save him from having had--various things said about him, Lady Jane.”
“No,” she said with a laugh. “I acknowledge it. Various things have been
said of him. The reason given was simply ludicrous. I don’t know if
Charlie invented it--but I don’t think he was clever enough to invent
it. It was something about putting money down pound for pound, or
shilling for shilling, or some nonsense, and that he would give Stella
to nobody that couldn’t do that. On the face of it that is folly, you
know.”
“I am not so sure that it is folly. I have heard him say something of
the kind; meaning, I suppose, that any son-in-law he would accept would
have to be as wealthy as himself.”
“But that is absolute madness, Dr. Burnet! Good heavens! who that was as
rich as old Tredgold could desire to be old Tredgold’s son-in-law? It is
against all reason. A man might forgive to the girls who are so nice in
themselves that they had such a father; but what object could one as
rich as himself---- Oh! it is sheer idiocy, you know.”
“Not to him; and he, after all, is the person most concerned,” said Dr.
Burnet, with his head cast down and rather a dejected look about him
altogether. The thought was not cheerful to himself any more than to
Lady Jane, and as a matter of fact he had not realised it before.
“But it cannot be,” she cried, “it cannot be; it is out of the question.
Oh, you are a man of resource; you must find out some way to baffle this
old curmudgeon. There must, there must,” she exclaimed, “be some way out
of it, if you care to try.”
“Trying will not invent thousands of pounds, alas! nor can the man who
has the greatest fund of resource but no money do it anyhow,” said Dr.
Burnet sententiously. “There may be a dodge----”
“That is what I meant. There must be a dodge to--to get you out of it,”
she cried.
“It is possible that the man whose existence you divine might not care
to get a wife--if she would have him to begin with--by a dodge, Lady
Jane.”
“Oh, rubbish!” cried the great lady, “we are not so high-minded as all
that. I am of opinion that in that way anything, everything can be done.
Charlie Somers is a fool and Stella another; but to a sensible pair with
an understanding between them and plenty of time to work--and an old
sick man,” Lady Jane laid an involuntary emphasis on the word sick--then
stopped and reddened visibly, though her countenance was rather
weather-beaten and did not easily show.
“A sick man--to be taken advantage of? No, I think that would scarcely
do,” he said. “A sensible pair with an understanding, indeed--but then
the understanding--there’s the difficulty.”
“No,” cried Lady Jane, anxiously cordial to wipe away the stain of her
unfortunate suggestion. “Not at all--the most natural thing in the
world--where there is real feeling, Dr. Burnet, on one side, and a
lonely, sensitive girl on the other----”
“A lonely, sensitive girl,” he repeated. And then he looked up in Lady
Jane’s face with a short laugh--but made no further remark.
Notwithstanding the safeguard of her complexion, Lady Jane this time
grew very red indeed; but having nothing to say for herself, she was
wise and made no attempt to say it. And he got up, having nothing
further to add by any possibility to his prescription, and put it into
her hand.
“I must make haste home,” he said, “the snow is very blinding, and the
roads by this time will be scarcely distinguishable.”
“I am sorry to have kept you so long--with my ridiculous cold, which is
really nothing. But Dr. Burnet,” she said, putting her hand on his
sleeve, “you will think of what I have said. Let justice be done to
those poor Somers. Their poverty is something tragic. They had so little
expectation of anything of the kind.”
“It is most unlikely that I can be of any use to them, Lady Jane,” he
said a little stiffly, as he accepted her outstretched hand.
Perhaps Lady Jane had more respect for him than ever before. She held
his prescription in her hand and looked at it for a moment.
“I think I’ll take it,” she said to herself as if making a heroic
resolution. She had really a little cold.
As for the doctor, he climbed up into his dog-cart and took the reins
from the benumbed hands of Jim, who was one mass of whiteness now
instead of the black form sprinkled over with flakes of white which he
had appeared at the Cliff. It was a difficult thing to drive home
between the hedges, which were no longer visible, and with the big
snow-flakes melting into his eyes and confusing the atmosphere, and he
had no time to think as long as he was still out in the open country,
without even the lights of Sliplin to guide him. It was very cold, and
his hands soon became as benumbed as Jim’s, with the reins not sensible
at all through his big gloves to his chilled fingers.
“I think we should turn to the left, here?” he said to Jim, who answered
“Yessir,” with his teeth chattering, “or do you think it should perhaps
be to the right?”
Jim said “Yessir,” again, dull to all proprieties.
If Jim had been by himself he would probably have gone to sleep, and
allowed the mare to find her own way home, which very likely she would
have done; but Dr. Burnet could not trust to such a chance. To think
much of what had been said to him was scarcely possible in these
circumstances. But when the vague and confused glimmer of the Sliplin
lights through the snow put his mind at rest, it cannot but be said that
Dr. Burnet found a great many thoughts waiting to seize hold upon him.
He was not perhaps surprised that Lady Jane should have divined his
secret. He had no particular desire to conceal it, and though he did not
receive Lady Jane’s offer with enthusiasm, he could not but feel that
her friendship and assistance would be of great use to him--in fact, if
not with Katherine, at least with other things. It would be good for him
professionally, even this one visit, and the prescription for Lady Jane,
not for Mrs. Cole, which must be made up at the chemist’s, would do him
good. A man who held the position of medical attendant at Steephill
received a kind of warrant of skill from the fact, which would bring
other patients of distinction. When Dr. Burnet got home, and got into
dry and comfortable clothes, and found no impatient messenger awaiting
him, it was with a grateful sense of ease that he gave himself up to the
study of this subject by the cheerful fire. His mind glanced over the
different suggestions of Lady Jane, tabulating and classifying them as
if they had been scientific facts. There was that hint about the old
sick man, which she had herself blushed for before it was fully uttered,
and at which Dr. Burnet now grinned in mingled wrath and ridicule. To
take advantage of an old sick man--as being that old man’s medical
attendant and desirous of marrying his daughter--was a suggestion at
which Burnet could afford to laugh, though fiercely, and with an
exclamation not complimentary to the intentions of Lady Jane. But there
were other things which required more careful consideration.
Should he follow these other suggestions, he asked himself? Should he
become a party to her plan, and get her support, and accept the
privileges of a visitor at her house as she had almost offered, and meet
Katherine there, which would probably be good for Katherine in other
ways as well as for himself? There was something very tempting in this
idea, and Dr. Burnet was not mercenary in his feeling towards Katherine,
nor indisposed to do “justice to Stella” in the almost incredible case
that it ever should be in his power to dispose of Mr. Tredgold’s
fortune. He could not help another short laugh to himself at the
absurdity of the idea. He to dispose of Mr. Tredgold’s fortune! So many
things were taken for granted in this ridiculous hypothesis. Katherine’s
acceptance and consent for one thing, of which he was not at all sure.
She had evidently sent the Rector about his business, which made him
glad, yet gave him a little thrill of anxiety too, for, though he was
ten years younger than the Rector, and had no family to encumber him,
yet Mr. Stanley, on the other hand, was a handsome man, universally
pleasing, and perhaps more desirable in respect to position than an
ordinary country practitioner--a man who dared not call his body, at
least, whatever might be said of his soul, his own; and who had as yet
had no opportunity of distinguishing himself. If she repulsed the one so
summarily, would she not have in all probability the same objections to
the other? At twenty-three a man of thirty-five is slightly elderly as
well as one of forty-seven.
Supposing, however, that Katherine should make no objection, which was a
very strong step for a man who did not in the least believe that at the
present moment she had even thought of him in that light--there was her
father to be taken into account. He had heard Mr. Tredgold say that
about the thousand for thousand told down on the table, and he had heard
it from the two ladies of the midge; but without, perhaps, paying much
attention or putting any great faith in it. How could he table thousand
for thousand against Mr. Tredgold? The idea was ridiculous. He had the
reversion of that little, but ancient, estate in the North, of which he
had been at such pains to inform Katherine; and he had a little money
from his mother; and his practice, which was a good enough practice, but
not likely to produce thousands for some time at least to come. He had
said there might be a dodge--and, as a matter of fact, there had blown
across his mind a suggestion of a dodge, how he might perhaps persuade
his uncle to “table” the value of Bunhope on his side. But what was the
value of Bunhope to the millions of old Tredgold? He might, perhaps, say
that he wanted nothing more with Katherine than the equivalent of what
he brought; but he doubted whether the old man would accept that
compromise. And certainly, if he did so, there could be no question of
doing justice to Stella out of the small share he would have of her
father’s fortune. No; he felt sure Mr. Tredgold would exact the entire
pound of flesh, and no less; that he would no more reduce his daughter’s
inheritance than her husband’s fortune, and that no dodge would blind
the eyes of the acute, businesslike old man.
This was rather a despairing point of view, from which Dr. Burnet tried
to escape by thinking of Katherine herself, and what might happen could
he persuade her to fall in love with him. That would make everything so
much more agreeable; but would it make it easier? Alas! falling in love
on Stella’s part had done no good to Somers; and Stella, though now cast
off and banished, had possessed a far greater influence over her father
than Katherine had ever had. Dr. Burnet was by no means destitute of
sentiment in respect to her. Indeed, it is very probable that had
Katherine had no fortune at all he would still have wished, and taken
earlier more decisive steps, to make her aware that he wished to secure
her for his wife; but the mere existence of a great fortune changes the
equilibrium of everything. And as it was there, Dr. Burnet felt that to
lose it, if there was any possible way of securing it, would be a great
mistake. He was the old man’s doctor, who ought to be grateful to him
for promoting his comfort and keeping him alive; and he was Katherine’s
lover, and the best if not the only one there was. And he had free
access to the house at all seasons, and a comfortable standing in the
drawing-room as well as in the master’s apartment. Surely something
must be made of these advantages by a man with his eyes open, neglecting
no opportunity. And, on the other hand, there was always the chance that
old Tredgold might die, thus simplifying matters. The doctor’s final
decision was that he would do nothing for the moment, but wait and
follow the leading of circumstances; always keeping up his watch over
Katherine, and endeavouring to draw her interest, perhaps in time her
affections, towards himself--while, on the other hand, it would commit
him to nothing to accept Lady Jane’s help, assuring her that--in the
case which he felt to be so unlikely of ever having any power in the
matter--he would certainly do “justice to Stella” as far as lay in his
power.
When he had got to this conclusion the bell rang sharply, and, alas! Dr.
Burnet, who had calculated on going to bed for once in comfort and
quiet, had to face the wintry world again and go out into the snow.