DR. CAMPERDOWN MAKES A MORNING CALL
Old Polypharmacy, Dr. Camperdown’s horse, attached to a sleigh, was
pegging slowly out one of the Arm roads on the day after his master’s
visit to Vivienne.
The afternoon was fine and brilliantly sunny, and Polypharmacy unharried
by a check-rein, and almost happy for once that he had blinders on, kept
his head down and his eyes half shut, on account of the dazzling glare
of the sun on the white fields of snow.
If Polypharmacy was half asleep, his master was certainly very wide
awake. He sat in a stooping attitude, his body responding to the bumps
and jerks of the little open sleigh bobbing over the hillocks of snow,
and his keen, bright eyes going like an eagle’s over in the direction of
Pinewood. When they reached the sullen, dark semicircle of evergreen
surrounding it, he slapped the reins smartly over the back of his lazy
quadruped, and ejaculated: “Hie on, Polypharmacy, and hear my
programme—to have my delayed conversation with my lady and get back to
town by five. Now comport yourself accordingly.”
Polypharmacy, with a disapproving toss of his head at his master’s
haste, yet thought it better to quicken his pace and was soon trotting
through the lodge gateway and up the drive to the house.
Arrived in front of the hall door, Camperdown sprang out of the sleigh
and attaching a weight to the head of his horse rang a smart peal on the
bell that brought a maid tripping to the door.
“I want to see Mrs. Colonibel,” he said in his usual lordly fashion and
striding past her into the house. “Is she at home?”
The girl clung to the door handle. “No, sir, she isn’t at home—that is,
she doesn’t want to see any one.”
“She’ll see me,” he said. “Take me to her.”
Mrs. Colonibel unaware of the visit in store for her, had after lunch
donned a dressing-gown of her favorite shade of red, had put on a pair
of bedroom slippers and had made her way to the smoking-room, an
apartment that was unoccupied at that time of day.
It was a constant source of chagrin to her that she had neither a maid
of her own nor a boudoir. A number of times she had hinted to her cousin
Stanton the desirability of bestowing on her these privileges, but so
far he had listened in unresponsive silence. Of the delight that would
fill her soul could she but speak of “my maid” and “my boudoir” while
engaging in conversation with her friends, that unsympathetic man had
not the slightest idea.
With brows drawn together she looked discontentedly about the little
room, which however, had a certain gaudy comfort of its own. A wood fire
was burning merrily in the grate, a big easy-chair by the window held
out inviting arms toward her. She had been at a sleighing party the
evening before and was tired, and she had a novel and a box of sweets
with which to console herself; so at last she sighed contentedly and
subsiding among soft cushions was soon deep in a tale of love and
sorrow.
At one of the most harrowing passages in the story, where the heroine
involved in a hundred embarrassments sees no chance of escape and where
her sad condition compelled Mrs. Colonibel to apply her handkerchief to
her eyes, she was startled by hearing in a deep voice,
“But Black Donald sat in his coffin and ate oat cake.”
Dropping her book she saw Dr. Camperdown hugging himself like a huge
bear before the fire. “Good afternoon,” he said; “I met that new
domestic of yours in the hall and asked her name. She said it was
Gregory. Every letter of that name is full of blood to me. Shall I tell
you why?”
“If you like,” said Mrs. Colonibel with an unamiability that affected
him not in the least.
“When I was a boy I used to visit at my uncle’s in Yarmouth county. A
man called Black Donald Gregory murdered his sister and cousin in a
quarrel, and the whole country rang with the story. The sheriff took
Black Donald to Yarmouth town to be hanged. On the road the sheriff
would say, ‘Black Donald, you have only twelve hours to live’; and Black
Donald would sit in his coffin eating oat cake and saying nothing. The
sheriff would say further, ‘Black Donald you have only eleven hours to
live.’ But Black Donald sat in his coffin eating oat cake all the way to
Yarmouth town. The sheriff warned him every hour, but Black Donald ate
oat cake to the last, cramming a bit in his mouth as he mounted the
scaffold. Queer story, isn’t it? It used to make my blood run cold.
Don’t mind it now.”
Flora shuddered, and without answering him picked up her book as a hint
to him to be gone. To her secret dismay he appeared to be just in the
humor for a gossip, and as he warmed his back at the fire said
agreeably,
“What’s that book you’re in such a hurry to get back to?”
Mrs. Colonibel reluctantly mentioned the name of the story.
“Been crying over it, haven’t you?” he asked. “Wasting tears over a
silly jade that never existed, and over a nice girl that does exist and
does suffer you’ll bestow not a word of sympathy. You women are queer
creatures.”
“Not a bit queerer than men,” said Mrs. Colonibel, goaded into a
response.
“Yes, you are,” he retorted. “For double-twistedness and mixed motives
and general incomprehensibility, commend me to women; and you’re
unbusinesslike, the most of you. You, Flora Colonibel, are now acting
dead against your own interests. What makes you so hateful to that
little French girl?”
Mrs. Colonibel moved uneasily about on her cushions. “She isn’t little,”
she said; “she is as tall as I am.”
“What makes you so hateful to her?” he said relentlessly.
“You should not talk in that way to me, Brian,” said Mrs. Colonibel in
an aggrieved tone of voice. “I’m not hateful to her.”
“Yes, you are; you know you are,—hateful and spiteful in little feminine
ways. You think people don’t notice it; they do.”
Mrs. Colonibel was a little frightened. “What do you mean, Brian?”
“Simply this. You have a young and fascinating girl under your roof. You
suppress her in spite of the fact that she will soon be a married woman
and in a position to lord it over you. People are talking about it
already.”
“That wretched Irish woman!” exclaimed Mrs. Colonibel; “I wish that she
had been born without a tongue.”
“Don’t be abusive and vulgar, Flora. Once you get that reputation there
isn’t a man in Halifax that will marry you. You know your ambition is to
get a husband; but you’re playing a very bad game just now, a very bad
one.”
At this bit of information, of which his victim was only too well
assured by her own inner consciousness, she began to shed tears of anger
and mortification.
“Don’t cry,” said Camperdown soothingly, drawing up a chair and sitting
astride it within easy reach of the box of sweetmeats on her lap, “and
don’t bite your handkerchief.”
She would have given the world to be alone, but she was obliged to sit
still, answering his questions and watching him coolly eat her sweets.
“Confide in me, Flora,” he said kindly; “I’m the best friend you have.
Tell me just how you feel toward Miss Delavigne.”
“I hate her,” she said, striking her teeth together and tearing her
handkerchief to shreds. “You’ve no idea how I hate her, Brian,” and she
burst into violent sobbing.
She had thrown off all disguise, as indeed she was often in the habit of
doing with him, for he understood her so well that she never could
deceive him and knew that she gained nothing by attempting to do so.
“That’s right,” he said, stripping the paper off a caramel and
transferring it to his cheek. “Unburden your conscience; you’ll feel
better. We’ll start from that. You hate her. People will hate each
other; you can’t help it. Now let us consider the subject without any
appeal to higher motives, which would only be an embarrassment in your
case, Flora. You can’t help hating her; do you hate yourself?”
“No,” indignantly, “you know I don’t.”
“No,” he repeated in accents of blandishment; “out of all the world the
person set up for your love and adoration is Flora Colonibel. Now in
hating Miss Delavigne, and in showing that you hate her, are you doing
Flora Colonibel good service?”
He would not proceed till she answered him, so at last she vouchsafed
him a sulky, “No.”
“You’re working right against Flora Colonibel,” he said. “You’re
blasting her prospects for worldly advancement; you’re preparing her for
an old age spent in a garret.”
Mrs. Colonibel shivered at the prospect held out before her, but said
nothing.
“What’s your income apart from what Stanton gives you?” he asked.
“Five hundred dollars a year,” reluctantly.
“Five hundred to a woman of your expensive tastes! How much was that
embroidered toga you have on?”
“Thirty dollars.”
“And your sandals, or whatever they are?”
“Three.”
“And the book?”
“Fifty cents.”
“The ring on your finger?”
“Fifty dollars.”
“That is eighty-three dollars and fifty cents. And you and Judy expect
to live on five hundred.” Throwing the empty confectionery box into the
fire, he rose as if, in intense disapproval of her plans for the future,
he could no longer stay with her.
Mrs. Colonibel was in a state bordering on hysterics. “What shall I do,
Brian?” she gasped, holding him convulsively.
“Mend your ways and increase your graces,” succinctly. “Stop nagging
Stanton, or he’ll turn you out of the house before you’re a twelvemonth
older. Treat ma’m’selle decently, and follow Stanton’s lead in
everything. He is your employer. He doesn’t love you overmuch, but he’ll
not be a hard one. Good-bye.” And gently pulling his coat from her
quivering hand, he sauntered from the room, muttering to himself,
“Medicine’s bitter, but it’s better for her to take it.”
Going on his way down the staircase he crossed the lower hall and looked
into the drawing room. Its only occupant was Valentine, who lay
stretched out at length on a sofa reading a book which he closed when he
saw Camperdown.
“Beastly cold day, isn’t it?” he asked, putting his hands under his
handsome, graceless head to prop it still higher.
“Depends upon your standpoint,” said Camperdown drily. “Where’s
Stanton?”
“In town—in his office, I suppose.”
“Why aren’t you there?”
“Oh, I’ve about cut the office. Stanton doesn’t make me very welcome
when I do go.”
“You’re of no use to him, probably.”
“Well, I don’t adore bookkeeping,” frankly; “and Stanton lets me take no
responsibility in buying or selling.”
“Suppose he should die, also your father, do you think you could carry
on the business?”
“Couldn’t I!” said Valentine, with all of a young man’s sublime
confidence in his own capabilities.
“I’d like to see you do it,” grimly. “Things would go ‘ker-smash,’ as
old Hannah says. What are you improving you mind with on this glorious
day? A literary family, forsooth.”
Valentine Armour, who with all his faults was as sunny-tempered as a
child, refused to tell him, and from mischievous motives solely, tried
to roll over on his book. He succeeded in getting it under him, and lay
on it laughing convulsively. He was slight and tall of figure, but his
strength was as nothing against the prodigious power that lay in
Camperdown’s limbs when he chose to exert himself.
Shaking Valentine like a rat, he lifted him with one hand by the
waistband, and dropped him on the hearth rug, where the young man sat
nursing his crossed legs, and convulsed with laughter at the various
expressions of disgust chasing themselves over the physician’s
plain-featured countenance.
“Too steep for you, eh, Brian?” he said teasingly.
“Erotic trash!” was the reply. “‘He crushed her in his arms’—reading
from the book—‘and smothered her with kisses, till terrified at his
passion she was——’ Bah! I’ll read no more. You young men read this
amatory rubbish and say, ‘That sounds lively,’ and look around for some
one to practise on. Why don’t you fill your mind with something solid
while you’re young. Do you think you are going to limp around into
driveling old age looking for some one to crush to your breast? If you
cram your mind with this stuff now, it’s all you’ll have when your gray
hairs come. You’re a fool, Valentine. Work is the main business of
life—making love an incident. I’ve had my eye on you for some time. You
have things reversed.”
“Thank you,” gayly. “Don’t you ever read novels?”
“Of course I do. Good novels have a mission. Many a one preaches a
sermon to people that never listen to a minister; but this
trash”—scornfully—"into the fire with it!" and he tossed the book among
the coals in the grate.
“Peace to its ashes,” said Valentine, stifling a yawn. “It was a slow
thing, anyway.”
“Come drive to town with me,” said Camperdown.
“Can’t; I’m tired. I was skating all the morning. I think I’ll go and
ask Judy for a cup of tea.”
“Is ma’m’selle civil to you?” asked Camperdown.
“Pretty much so. I’m trying to get up a flirtation with her, but she’s
too high and mighty to flirt, though she could very well do it if she
tried.”
“I’m glad there’s one girl that doesn’t worship your doll face.”
“That she won’t flirt with me is no sign that she doesn’t,” said
Valentine saucily. "Go to your patients, Camperdown, and leave the girls
to me.
“His pills as thick as hand grenades flew,
And where they fell as certainly they slew.”
Camperdown threw a sofa cushion at him, but Valentine dodged it, and
placing himself comfortably by the fire watched lazily through the
window the energetic manner in which the friend of his family jumped
into his sleigh and drove away.