THE VAGABOND RECEIVED IN THE MANOR-HOUSE AT FAWLEY.
Very lamely, very feebly, declining Lionel's arm, and leaning heavily on
his crutch-stick, Waife crossed the threshold of the Manor-house. George
sprang forward to welcome him. The old man looked on the preacher's face
with a kind of wandering uncertainty in his eye, and George saw that his
cheek was very much flushed. He limped on through the hall, still
leaning on his staff, George and Lionel at either side. A pace or two,
and there stood Darrell! Did he, the host, not spring forward to offer
an arm, to extend a hand? No; such greeting in Darrell would have been
but vulgar courtesy. As the old man's eye rested on him, the superb
gentleman bowed low--bowed as we bow to kings!
They entered the library. Darrell made a sign to George and Lionel.
They understood the sign, and left visitor and host alone.
Lionel drew George into the quaint old dining-hall. "I am very uneasy
about our dear friend," he said, in agitated accents. "I fear that I
have had too little consideration for his years and his sensitive nature,
and that, what with the excitement of the conversation that passed
between us and the fatigue of the journey, his nerves have broken down.
We were not half-way on the road, and as we had the railway-carriage to
ourselves, I was talking to him with imprudent earnestness, when he began
to tremble all over, and went into an hysterical paroxysm of mingled
tears and laughter. I wished to stop at the next station, but he was not
long recovering, and insisted on coming on. Still, as we approached
Fawley, after muttering to himself, as far as I could catch his words,
incoherently, he sank into a heavy state of lethargy or stupor, resting
his head on my shoulder. It was with difficulty I roused him when he
entered the park."
"Poor old man," said George feelingly; "no doubt the quick succession of
emotions through which he has lately passed has overcome him for the
time. But the worst is now passed. His interview with Darrell must
cheer his heart and soothe his spirits; and that interview over, we must
give him all repose and nursing. But tell me what passed between you--if
he was very indignant that I could not suffer men like you and my uncle
Alban and Guy Darrell to believe him a picklock and a thief."
Lionel began his narrative, but had not proceeded far in it before
Darrell's voice was heard shouting loud, and the library bell rang
violently.
They hurried into the library, and Lionel's fears were verified. Waife
was in strong convulsions; and as these gradually ceased, and he rested
without struggle, half on the floor, half in Darrell's arms, he was
evidently unconscious of all around him. His eye was open, but fixed in
a glassy stare. The servants thronged into the room; one was despatched
instantly to summon the nearest medical practitioner. "Help me--George--
Lionel," said Darrell, "to bear him up-stairs. Mills, light us." When
they reached the landing-place, Mills asked, "Which room, sir?" Darrell
hesitated an instant, then his grey eye lit into its dark fire. "My
father's room--he shall rest on my father's bed."
When the surgeon arrived, he declared Waife to be in imminent danger--
pressure on the brain. He prescribed prompt and vigorous remedies, which
had indeed before the surgeon's arrival suggested themselves to, and been
partly commenced by, Darrell, who had gone through too many varieties of
experience to be unversed in the rudiments of leechcraft. "If I were in
my guest's state," asked Darrell of the practitioner, "what would you
do?"
"Telegraph instantly for Dr. F------."
"Lionel--you hear? Take my own horse--he will carry you like the wind.
Off to --------; it is the nearest telegraph station."
Darrell did not stir from Waife's bedside all that anxious eight. Dr.
F------ arrived at morning. He approved of all that had been done, but
nevertheless altered the treatment; and after staying some hours, said to
Darrell: "I am compelled to leave you for the present, nor could I be of
use in staying. I have given all the aid in my power to Nature--we must
leave the rest to Nature herself. That fever--those fierce throes and
spasms--are but Nature's efforts to cast off the grasp of the enemy we do
not see. It now depends on what degree of rallying power be left to the
patient. Fortunately his frame is robust, yet not plethoric. Do you
know his habits?"
"I know," answered George--" most temperate, most innocent."
"Then, with constant care, minute attention to my directions, he may
recover."
"If care and attention can save my guest's life, he shall not die," said
Darrell.
The physician looked at the speaker's pale face and compressed lips.
"But, Mr. Darrell, I must not have you on my hands too. You must not be
out of your bed again tonight."
"Certainly not," said George. "I shall watch alone."
"No," cried Lionel, "that is my post too."
"Pooh!" said Darrell; "young men so far from Death are not such watchful
sentinels against his stroke as men of my years, who have seen him in all
aspects; and, moreover, base indeed in the host who deserts his own
guest's sick-chamber. Fear not for me, doctor; no man needs sleep less
than I do."
Dr. F------ slid his hand on Darrell's pulse. "Irregular--quick; but
what vitality! what power!--a young man's pulse. Mr. Darrell, many years
for your country's service are yet in these lusty beats."
Darrell breathed his chronic sigh, and turning back to Waife's bedside,
said to the doctor, "When will you come again?"
"The day after to-morrow."
When the doctor returned, Waife was out of immediate danger. Nature,
fortified by the "temperate, innocent habits" which husband up her
powers, had dislodged, at least for a time, her enemy; but the attack was
followed by extreme debility. It was clear that for days, perhaps even
weeks to come, the vagrant must remain a prisoner under Darrell's roof-
tree.
Lionel had been too mindful of Sophy's anxiety to neglect writing to Lady
Montfort the day after Waife's seizure. But he could not find the heart
to state the old man's danger; and with the sanguine tendencies of his
young nature, even when at the worst he clung to belief in the best. He
refrained from any separate and private communication of Waife's state to
Lady Montfort, lest the sadness it would not fail to occasion her should
be perceptible to Sophy, and lead her to divine the cause. So he
contented himself with saying that Waife had accompanied him to Mr.
Darrell's, and would be detained there, treated with all kindness and
honour, for some days.
Sophy's mind was relieved by this intelligence, but it filled her with
wonder and conjecture. That Waife, who had so pertinaciously refused to
break bread as a guest under any man's roof-tree, should be for days
receiving the hospitality of Lionel Haughton's wealthy and powerful
kinsman, was indeed mysterious. But whatever brought Waife and Lionel
thus in confidential intercourse could not but renew yet more vividly the
hopes she had been endeavouring of late to stifle. And combining
together many desultory remembrances of words escaped unawares from
Lionel, from Lady Montfort, from Waife himself, the truth (of which her
native acuteness had before admitted glimpses) grew almost clear to her.
Was not Mr. Darrell that relation to her lost mother upon whom she had
claims not hitherto conceded? Lionel and Waife both with that relation
now! Surely the clouds that had rested on her future were admitting the
sun through their opening rents--and she blushed as she caught its ray.