The doctor had fallen into more than one fit of musing since the one
that carried him three doors beyond his destination on the morning
Enoch’s wheels were being fitted, and the result was, that he had come
to a determination. But as he always kept his determinations very
quietly to himself until it was time to act upon them, no one was any
the wiser for it as yet. But at last, when the snow-banks had dwindled
away under the spring sun, until only a stray mound was left here or
there, and the earth began to peep out once more, brown and bare, the
doctor made up his mind that the time had come. He had just arrived
at that conclusion, when his office-door opened, and some one came
softly in. He knew the step, and could see the tall, gaunt form of old
Joan, the housekeeper, with her apron-strings tied in a hard knot, her
silver-rimmed spectacles, and her high-crowned cap, just as well as
if he had raised his eyes from his book. But Joan never liked to be
noticed when she came in; so he went on reading, with his feet in the
chair before him, as though no one were within a thousand miles.
Joan had only come to see about the fire, that was all; at least all
she meant should be understood; but the doctor knew very well, from
the endless brushing she was giving the hearth, that she had something
on her mind that would bring her round in front of his chair if he
only gave her time enough, and this suited him very well, as he had
something to say to her himself. Joan had followed the doctor from the
time he needed a nurse until he required a housekeeper, and she would
have been almost ready to quarrel even with him, if she had heard him
talk to Creepy about their owning shares in the world together, for
it was very much her opinion that the world was made for the doctor
exclusively; and if there were a few other people in it, that was
principally for the purpose of supplying him with a round of patients.
“Ah but he’s a braw laddie, and ony auld heart might weel be proud o’
raising sic a bairn,” she said to herself, as she glanced toward him
once or twice while she still brushed vigorously away at the hearth,
“though it’s true I never taught him the fashion he has o’ taking the
chair before him that’s almost higher than his head to tilt his feet
in, like a parrot fingering the trammels o’ his cage. It’s no so unco
handsome as the rest o’ him, but what can a young man do, shut up in a
room like this, with never a fair face to smile on him from ane years
end to anither; and if he were to bring a young wife hame wi’ him, wha
kens where old Joan might find hersel’ then? Na, na, it’s no change o’
that kind I’m asking, but _some_ things ought to gae differently, for
the pride o’ the house, and if he doesna see it for himsel’, why then
old Joan maun e’en speak her ain thocht, that is a’.”
But the speaking did not seem so easy after all, and Joan had
come fairly round before the doctor’s chair, as he had expected,
hearth-broom in hand, without getting her words into shape.
This wouldn’t do. He had something to settle with Joan himself, and he
must catch her in a propitious frame: at the same time he knew that if
he spoke first, everything would go wrong; so without looking up from
his book, he carelessly touched another that lay on the chair before
him, with his foot, and down it went upon the floor, and the flood
gates were opened.
“Hoot, mon!” exclaimed Joan, stooping to pick it up, and wiping it
tenderly with the corner of her apron, “hoot, mon, and canna ye be
content wi’ finding yoursel’ maister o’ a book like this, that not
one out o’ ten thousand o’ your neebors has learning eno’ to ken the
meaning o’ the very cover itsel’, that ye maun toss it under foot in
sic a fashion? It’s no that I begrudge gathering it up again, but I
dinna like aught belonging to yoursel’ to meet wi’ disrespect, and
that’s what I’m fearing ilka day will be coming to the house, a’though
no fault o’ mine. Not that I fash mysel’ sae muckle if folk maun e’en
mind ither folk’s affairs, but I’m an auld woman to be keeping up the
credit o’ an establishment like this.”
“You want some one to help you, Joan?”
“Help me!” exclaimed Joan indignantly, brushing her apron off sidewise
with both hands, as if to brush away the aspersion, “ye ken weel enough
Joan wants nae help, nor ever will, while her two hands can serve the
laddie she raised up to be the learned man he is, wi’ half the city
running after him to save their lives and show them the way out o’
trouble. Nae, nae, it’s no the work I’m fretting after, it’s only the
gude and proper face o’ things before the een o’ the world.”
The doctor looked up at her as if he could not understand a word.
“But you’ve always been called a remarkably good-looking woman, Joan,
and I don’t see that you look a day older than you did the first time I
saw you.”
“Whist, mon!” and Joan brushed the apron harder than ever, “wad ye
drive the patience clear frae a body? Dinna ye ken that ilka time
there’s a summons for your services, if it’s the richest mon in the
town sending for you to come and bring him back from the grave, there’s
naebody but an auld woman with her cap and spectacles to open the door
for him? The cap may be as white as snaw, but it’s no the livery that’s
becoming to a skelfu’ doctor’s house, and are whose name will soon be
kenned far an’ wide among the wisest o’ ’em.”
“But what would you have me do, Joan? A young doctor may have all the
wisdom of Solomon, but he’s got his way to make, and his porridge to
earn, for all that, and he must wait awhile before he can afford to
waste his fees on the vanities of life.”
“Waste! And wha kens better than yoursel’ that it would be neither
waste nor vanity to ha’ things fitting and becoming and commanding
the respect that’s due a high calling like your ain? And what great
physician’s house did I ever see among my ain at home that had na his
footman or two to open the door before ever a body had time to lay
hold upon the handle o’ the bell?”
“Suppose I get one then?” asked the doctor, looking very gravely in her
face.
“You’re no serious,” she said; “you’re no so easy to persuade, or to
come round to the sound o’ reason a’ in the moment a body just sets it
before your een.”
“No,” said the doctor, “I don’t suppose I am, but the truth is I’ve
been thinking of the same thing myself. But you know,” and the doctor
got up, laid down his book and shook himself, “you know, Joan, every
ladder must have its lower rounds, and you must not expect all the
glory of midday, when the sun is just getting above the horizon. Now
suppose my new man should be rather small and rather young, so young
in fact that it would be a good thing for him to go to school, out of
office hours. That wouldn’t make any difference, I suppose, in the
welcome you would give him, or the kindness you would show him when he
came in your way?”
Joan looked doubtful.
“It’s no a’ the gither what I wad choose,” she said, “but half a
bannock’s better than nae loaf at a’, and young folk grow, if you do
but gie ’em time. But he suld be a braw laddie, weel favored and wi’
good back and legs.”
“Weel favored enough,” said the doctor laughing, “but as for the back
and legs, they are good in their way; and getting better every day, but
I fear we can’t make any more of them than the best a hunchback ever
had.”
Joan’s face grew white. A hunchback opening the doctor’s door? She
would open it herself if she were a hundred years old, sooner than that
should happen!
“I’ll tell you about him,” went on the doctor, not seeming to notice
her; and beginning as far back as the night in Ben’s room, he gave Joan
a running sketch of the lame child as he had found him, of the dreary
life, the great wistful eyes, the pain that was never tired, and the
sensitive soul, shrinking away behind the “all but me” that had seemed
always to rise like stony walls before it.
“Now a strong man with any soul in him can’t see a child in a prison
like that, without wanting to knock the gates down for him, if he can,”
went on the doctor, “and that’s what I’ve been trying to do the last
six months, with the help of all hands out there; and I don’t think
we’ve made a bad piece of work of it as far as we’ve gone. I’ve got
the little fellow on his feet again, and he’s had more than one walk
already, since the snow is passing off, and he’s beginning to believe
all I’ve told him, or thinks he does, but it’s more like a story than
anything else, so far, and I want to make it a reality. I want to get
him away from that place out there, and get him in here where things
are civilized, and put him, as soon as he gets a little more strength,
into the best school there is, and let him measure himself with other
boys of his age, and see what he can make of himself and the world he’s
come into. And I don’t see any way to do this, but to indulge myself
in an office-boy for certain hours of the day. The child must have a
shelter, and some one to look to; and he’ll want more than I can be
to him too. A friend something like yourself for instance, Joan;” and
the doctor darted one of those quick looks and wonderful smiles at the
housekeeper, that always made Creepy’s heart leap to his throat. Joan’s
face ceased to be white long before the doctor had finished, and there
was something the matter with her spectacles; she couldn’t see well
through them, and there was a struggle going on behind them that was
plain enough. It was a drawn battle for a few moments more, and Joan
flourished the hearth-broom again, as if determined to knock over one
side or the other with it, but at last she spoke.
“Puir bairnie,” she said, “it’s no mysel’ that wad we in the way o’ a
work like what you hae been doin’, and if I have na the skill to help
you in what you hae to do wi’ the puir crooked back, I can e’en comfort
the lane heart a bit now and then, and help it take courage for the
fight with the world, that is na sae bad after a’ as some folk would
ca’ it, nor bad enough to think the worse o’ a young doctor that’s
willing to shelter one o’ the Lord’s sorrowful bairns, when he might
hae the finest pair o’ hands in the country to open the door for those
that are looking for him.”
“Good for you, Joan,” said the doctor, smiling again, “and you needn’t
fear any one is going to look as far as the limbs after they once get
sight of the pair of eyes that shine out above them.”
“That’s all right,” he added to himself a moment later, as he shook the
reins over the black horse’s head. “Creepy has Joan for his friend for
ever; now for Mrs. Ganderby.”