KELVIN'S ILLNESS.
Matthew Kelvin found himself considerably better the morning of the
day following that on which he had been taken ill at Stammars, but in
the course of the afternoon he had a sharp return of the previous
symptoms. Then it was that his mother insisted upon sending for Dr.
Druce, the family practitioner, and Olive seconded the plea. Up to
this time Kelvin had strenuously refused to let any one be called in,
but he now yielded reluctantly to his mother's wishes. He had never
been ill enough to need the services of a doctor since those far-off
juvenile days of measles and scarlatina, and he was loth to believe
that there was any necessity for such services now.
However, in the course of the day, Dr. Druce looked in. He felt his
patient's pulse, looked at his tongue, and asked the usual questions.
Then he took off his spectacles, pursed up his mouth, shook his head
at Kelvin as though he were an offending schoolboy, and delivered
himself oracularly. "Disordered state of stomach. Nothing serious. Put
you right in a day or two. Must diet yourself more carefully in
future. What really charming weather we are having."
Everybody agreed that Dr. Druce was seventy years old; many averred
that he was nearly eighty. The latter people it probably was who
asserted that the doctor was purblind, that his memory was half gone,
that it was hardly safe for him to practise, and that he ought to
retire and make room for a younger man. The doctor, however, still
considered himself to be in the prime of his powers, and as he had
attended Mrs. Kelvin herself for a long series of years, and was,
besides, an old personal friend of that lady, it was not likely that
she would think of calling in any other assistance to her son.
As soon as Dr. Druce's visit had relieved in some measure his mother's
anxiety, Kelvin began to express his desire that Olive should get back
to Stammers without delay. "I shall be all right in a day or two," he
said, "and my mother, or one or other of the servants, will see
meanwhile that I want for nothing."
"I shall wait till to-morrow, and see how you are then, before I think
of going back," said Olive. "You know that my aunt can do nothing in
the way of waiting upon you, and as for the servants, they are all
very well in their places, but they would be quite out of their
element in a sick-room."
"A sick-room, indeed! You talk as if I were going to be laid up for a
month," said Kelvin, impatiently.
"I talk simple common sense, Matthew," said Olive. "Besides, Lady
Dudgeon promised me a holiday a month ago, and I don't see why I
should not take it now. In fact, I may tell you that I have already
written to her ladyship telling her not to expect me back for three or
four days."
"Cool, I must say. Not but what you are welcome to stay here as long
as you like: cela va sans dire; and I am greatly obliged to you for
what you have done for me already. But as for spending your holiday in
waiting on me--that's pure nonsense. A week at the seaside, now, is
what you ought to have."
"Which to me would mean a week in a strange place among people whom I
never saw before and should never see again. I would sooner hear Sophy
and Carry their lessons from year's end to year's end than indulge in
such a holiday as that."
"I shall be better to-morrow, you mark my words if I'm not, and then
we'll have a little further talk about your holiday."
But he was by no means better next morning; rather worse, indeed, if
anything. It was nothing, Dr. Druce said. The medicine sent by him
had, perhaps, had the effect of increasing the sickness, but the
patient himself was no worse than on the preceding day. A little time
and a little patience were needed. It was not to be expected that an
evil which had been growing for months, perhaps even for year, could
be put right in a day or two.
Kelvin said nothing to Olive that day about going back to Stammars. He
was very ill indeed, and he could not help admitting to himself that
it was a great comfort to have Olive to wait upon him. His mother, at
the best of times, would not have been of much use in a sick-room,
seeing that it was a matter of difficulty for her to walk across the
floor, and the very fact of Matthew being so ill only tended to make
her worse than usual. As for a hired nurse, Kelvin shuddered at the
thought. But such a nurse as Olive made all the difference. "You might
have been born to this sort of thing, from the way you go, about it,"
he said to her.
"You forget that for many years my father kept a chemist's shop in a
poor neighbourhood," she replied, "and that I seem to have been
familiar with sickness and disease since I can remember anything."
"You are a clever girl, Olive, and I believe you could doctor me a
deuced sight better than old Druce. I remember when I was a lad
hearing your father say that you knew almost as much about his drugs
and messes as he did himself."
Olive's back was towards him as he spoke, and she did not answer for a
moment or two. "That is a long time ago," she said, in a low voice;
"and such knowledge as that is easily forgotten. Then, again, you
remember how poor papa always would exaggerate a little."
How deft and noiseless were all her movements in the sick man's room!
How soft, and white, and cool were her hands! Her dress never rustled,
her shoes never creaked, her voice itself was attuned to the place and
the occasion. She was never hurried; nothing seemed to put her out.
She would either read to her cousin, or talk to him, or sit for hours
by his side doing some noiseless stitching that would not have
disturbed the slumbers of a mouse. When he was more than ordinarily
restless she would bathe his head with eau-de-Cologne or aromatic
vinegar, or sometimes, leaving his door ajar, she would go into the
other room and play some of his favourite airs softly on the piano,
and so, little by little, charm him out of his restless mood and
soothe him off into a refreshing sleep.
It was on the evening of the second day that Mrs. Kelvin called Olive
on one side. "You will not leave me to-morrow, unless my dear boy is
better?" said the old lady, with tears in her eyes.
"I will not leave you to-morrow, or next week, or next month, unless
my cousin is better," said Olive. "You may take my word for that."
"Heaven bless you, dear!" said Mrs. Kelvin, fervently; and she made as
though she would kiss Olive, but the latter started back.
"I think Matthew is calling me," she said, and she hurried into the
other room.
One day passed after another, and still Dr. Druce's patient did not
improve.
"These cases are sometimes very obstinate, indeed," said the old
gentleman, pleasantly, as he peered into his snuff-box in search of a
last pinch. "And then they not unfrequently affect the liver. Now, I
don't know a more obstinate noun substantive in the whole of the
English language than your disordered liver. As for the increasing
weakness that you complain about--why, I don't care much about that,
because it tends to keep down any febrile symptoms. Of course, if you
can't eat you can't keep up your strength; but when you once take a
turn, you know, you'll have the appetite of a wolf--I may say, the
appetite of a wolf in winter."
"What a comfort it is, dear," said Mrs. Kelvin to Olive, "to think
that we are in the hands of such a nice clever man as Dr. Druce. He
has had so much experience that I believe he can tell at a glance what
is the matter with a patient. Experience, in the medical profession,
is everything."
Sir Thomas and Lady Dudgeon drove over to see Mr. Kelvin a couple of
days before their return to London. They were greatly concerned at his
illness. As regarded Miss Deane, permission was given her to stay with
her cousin as long as it might be necessary for her to do so. The
young ladies, her pupils, were gone to pay a long-deferred visit to an
aunt of theirs, and it was quite uncertain when they would return.
One of Olive's difficulties was thus smoothed away for her without any
trouble on her part.
A few hours after Sir Thomas's visit, Mr. Kelvin suddenly opened his
hollow eyes. "Olive, where is my mother?" he asked, abruptly.
"She was tired, and she has gone to lie down for half an hour."
"Then you and I can have a little talk together."
Olive guessed instinctively what was coming. "If what you were about
to say to me is not very important, I would leave it unsaid to-day, if
I were you," she answered. "You have done more talking already than is
good for you."
As if to verify her words, he was suddenly taken with a severe fit of
sickness which lasted several minutes and left him thoroughly
exhausted.
Laying his wasted fingers on Olive's arm, and drawing her towards him,
"What I was about to say was this," he whispered. "Since I have been
lying here, I have had time to think of many things. But the thing
that has weighed heaviest on my mind, the thing that I have regretted
most, is my treatment of Eleanor Lloyd. It was you, Olive, who
persuaded me to hide the truth from her, to let her live on in
ignorance of her real history; to--to--you understand what I mean."
"You know what my motives in the matter were, Matthew," said Olive, in
a low voice.
"Yes, I know quite well what they were, and very mean and despicable
they seem to me now. Mind, I am not going to reproach you. The fault
was mine in allowing myself to be persuaded by you. In any case, the
past is the past, and nothing can alter it; but, so sure as I now lie
here, the very first day that I can crawl downstairs, I will send for
Miss Lloyd, tell her everything, and ask her forgiveness for the wrong
I have done her!"
He said no more, but shut his eyes and seemed as if he were going to
sleep.
Olive at this time had got Gerald Warburton's letter upstairs, and
had, in fact, already answered it in the way that we have seen. For a
moment she was tempted to show the letter to her cousin, but before
she could make up her mind to do so, Kelvin was asleep or seemed to
be. So telling herself that she did not care to disturb him, she let
the opportunity go by, and as Kelvin, when he awoke, did not again
recur to the subject, there seemed to be no reason why she should do
so. Not much longer could the climax be delayed, not much longer could
Eleanor Lloyd be kept in ignorance; of that Olive was quite aware; but
she would, if possible, delay the revelation for a little while; delay
it till Mr. Kelvin should have thoroughly recovered from his illness,
and having got rid of all his foolish sick-bed fancies, should be
prepared to carry out the scheme in all its features as originally
proposed by her and agreed to by him.
But when would Mr. Kelvin have recovered from his illness? That was a
question which, as yet, Olive was not prepared to answer. Sometimes it
seemed to her that her plot was slowly working itself round to the
fulfilment for which she so ardently longed; sometimes it seemed as if
no such fulfilment were possible to her. That her cousin liked to have
her by his side, liked to have her wait upon him, she saw clearly
enough, and she fancied that with each day she became more
indispensable to him. But was his heart touched by her devotion; was
he slowly but surely learning to love her? That was a problem which at
present she could in nowise solve. Time and patience might work
wonders for her, and with them as her allies she saw no reason, when
in her more sanguine moods, to despair of ultimate success. Having
gone so far, having ventured so much, it was not likely, as she said
to herself, that she should go back, that she should let herself be
overcome by any childish timidity or nonsensical scruples, when, for
aught she knew to the contrary, she might at that very moment be on
the brink of success. She never knew what a day, what an hour, might
bring forth. At some moment when least expected her cousin might put
forth his hand and say to her, "Olive, my heart has come round to you
again. I love you. Be my wife." If such a prize were not to be won
without risk, she was prepared to run that risk, whatever it might
involve.
There were times when Kelvin's mysterious malady caused him to suffer
acutely. At such moments Olive was always by his side, "a ministering
angel," as her cousin himself called her one day; soothing him with
the gentlest attentions, anticipating each want intuitively, making
herself, in fact, so indispensable to him that after a while he could
hardly bear to let her go out of his sight, and if, when he woke up,
she were not by his side, he would cry, fretfully, "Where's Olive? Why
isn't she here?" and toss and turn restlessly till he felt her soft
cold hand laid on his brow.
But even Olive's nerves of steel gave way sometimes. When, at
midnight, or later than that, she would steal out of her cousin's room
in the hope of getting an hour or two's sleep, sleep would not come to
her. All tired as she was, she would fling herself on her bed, and,
burying her face in her pillow, cry for an hour at a time as if her
heart would break. To see the man she loved so passionately suffer as
he suffered; to know that she had but to hold up her little finger, as
it were, for his sufferings to cease, but that if she were to let her
compassion so master her he would be lost to her for ever; to know
that her only chance of winning him was to win him through those
sufferings which she alone could soothe: to feel and know all this was
at times, especially in the midnight darkness of her own room, torture
unspeakable. But when, at cockcrow, the ebony gates of the realm of
shadows and midnight fancies were silently shut, and when another day
looked in at the windows with its clear cold eyes, the purpose of
Olive Deane faltered no longer: her strong will re-asserted itself,
and tears and compunction alike were for the time being thrust
mercilessly out of sight.
"Oh, doctor, doctor, when are you going to get me downstairs again?"
the sick man would sometimes wearily ask. "I am so terribly tired of
lying here."
To which the old gentleman, tapping his snuff-box, would blandly
reply: "That Mr. Liver is a deuce of a fellow to get right again
when once he's really put out. So obstinate, you know, and all
that. Wants a deal of coaxing. But we shall bring him to his senses
by-and-by--yes, yes, by-and-by, never fear."