CHAPTER VI.

THE day had come, and almost the hour. The weary time had stolen,

endless, yet flying on noiseless wings; an eternity of featureless

lingering hours, yet speeding, speeding towards that one fixed end. And

there was no reprieve. The important people of Poolborough had retired

sullenly from their endeavours. To support a Government faithfully and

yet not to have one poor favour granted--their recommendation to mercy

turned back upon themselves; they were indignant, and in that grievance

they forgot the original cause of it. Still there were one or two still

toiling on. But the morning of the fatal day had dawned and nothing had

come.

To tell how Mrs. Surtees and Agnes had lived through these days is

beyond our power. They did not live; they dragged through a feverish

dream from one time of seeing him to another, unconscious what passed

in the meantime, except when some messenger would come to their door,

and a wild blaze and frenzy of hope would light up in their miserable

hearts: for it always seemed to them that it must be the reprieve which

was coming, though each said to herself that it would not, could not,

come. And when they saw Jim, that one actual recurring point in their

lives was perhaps more miserable than the intervals. For to see him,

and to know that the hour was coming ever nearer and nearer when he

must die; to sit with him, never free from inspection, never out of

hearing of some compulsory spectator; to see the tension of his nerves,

the strain of intolerable expectation in him--was almost more than

flesh and blood could bear. They had privileges which were not allowed

in ordinary cases--for were not they still ranked among the best people

of Poolborough, though beaten down by horrible calamity? What could

they say to him? Not even the religious exhortations, the prayers which

came from other lips less trembling. They were dumb. “Dear Jim,” and

“God bless you,” was all they could say. Their misery was too great,

there was no utterance in it; a word would have overthrown the enforced

and awful calm. And neither could he speak. When he had said “Mother,”

and kissed her, and smiled, that was all. Then they sat silent holding

each other’s hands.

Through all this Dr. Barrère was the only human supporter of the

miserable family. He had promised to stand by Jim, to the end, not

to leave him till life had left him--till all was over. And now

the supreme moment had nearly come. The doctor was as pale, almost

paler than he who was about to die. There was an air about him of

sternness, almost of desperation; yet to Jim he was tender as his

mother. He had warned the authorities what he feared, that agitation

and excitement might even yet rob the law of its victim. He had been

allowed to be with the condemned man from earliest dawn of the fatal

morning in consequence of the warning he had given, but it appeared

to the attendants that Jim himself bore a less alarming air than the

doctor, whose colourless face and haggard eyes looked as if he had

not slept for a week. Jim, poor Jim, had summoned all his courage for

this supreme moment. There was a sweetness in his look that added to

its youthfulness. He looked like a boy: his long imprisonment and

the enforced self-denial there was in it, had chased from his face

all stains of evil. He was pale and worn with his confinement and

with the interval of awful waiting, but his eyes were clear as a

child’s--pathetic, tender, with a wistful smile in them, as though the

arrival of the fatal hour had brought relief. The old clergyman who had

baptised him had come, too, to stand by him to the last, and he could

scarcely speak for tears. But Jim was calm, and smiled; if any bit of

blue sky was in that cell of the condemned, with all its grim and

melancholy memories, it was in Jim’s face.

The doctor moved about him not able to keep still, with that look of

desperation, listening for every sound. But all was still except the

broken voice of the old clergyman, who had knelt down and was praying.

One of the attendants too had gone down on his knees. The other stood

watching, yet distracted by a pity which even his hardened faculties

could not resist. Jim sat with his hands clasped, his eyes for a moment

closed, the smile still quivering about his mouth. In this stillness of

intense feeling all observation save that of the ever-watchful doctor

was momentarily subdued. Suddenly Jim’s head seemed to droop forward

on his breast; the doctor came in front of him with one swift step,

and through the sound of the praying called imperatively, sharply,

for wine, wine! The warder who was standing rushed to fill it out,

while Dr. Barrère bent over the fainting youth. It all passed in a

moment, before the half-said sentence of the prayer was completed. The

clergyman’s voice wavered, stopped--and then resumed again, finishing

the phrase, notwithstanding the stir and hurried movement, the

momentary breathless scuffle, which a sudden attack of illness, a fit

or faint, always occasions. Then a sharp sound broke the stillness--the

crash of the wine glass which the doctor let fall from his hand after

forcing the contents, as it seemed, down the patient’s throat. The old

clergyman on his knees still, paused and opening his eyes gazed at the

strange scene, not awakening to the seriousness of it, or perceiving

any new element introduced into the solemnity of the situation for

some minutes, yet gazing with tragic eyes, since nothing in the first

place could well be more tragic. The little stir, the scuffle of the

moving feet, the two men in motion about the still figure in the chair,

lasted for a little longer; then the warder uttered a stifled cry. The

clergyman on his knees, his heart still in his prayer for the dying,

felt it half profane to break off into words to men in the midst of

those he was addressing to God--but forced by this strange break cried,

“What is it?--what has happened?” in spite of himself.

There was no immediate answer. The doctor gave some brief, quick

directions, and with the help of the warder lifted the helpless figure,

all fallen upon itself like a ruined house, with difficulty to the bed.

The limp, long, helpless limbs, the entire immobility and deadness of

the form struck with a strange chill to the heart of the man who had

been interceding wrapt in another atmosphere than that of earth. The

clergyman got up from his knees, coming back with a keen and awful

sense of his humanity. “Has he--fainted?” he asked with a gasp.

Once more a dead pause, a stillness in which the four men heard their

hearts beating; then the doctor said, with a strange brevity and

solemnity, “Better than that--he is dead.”

Dead! They gathered round and gazed in a consternation beyond words.

The young face, scarcely paler than it had been a moment since, the

eyes half shut, the lips fallen apart with that awful opening which is

made by the exit of the last breath, lay back upon the wretched pillow

in all that abstraction and incalculable distance which comes with the

first touch of death. No one could look at that, and be in any doubt.

The warders stood by dazed with horror and dismay, as if they had let

their prisoner escape. Was it their fault? Would they be blamed for it?

They had seen men go to the scaffold before with little feeling, but

they had never seen one die of the horror of it, as Jim had died.

While they were thus standing a sound of measured steps was heard

without. The door was opened with that harsh turning of the key which

in other circumstances would have sounded like the trumpet of doom,

but which now woke no tremor, scarcely any concern. It was the sheriff

and his grim procession coming for the prisoner. They streamed in and

gathered astonished about the bed. Dr. Barrère turned from where he

stood at the head, with a face which was like ashes--pallid, stern, the

nostrils dilating, the throat held high. He made a solemn gesture with

his hand towards the bed. “You come too late,” he said.

The men had come in almost silently, in the excitement of the moment

swelling the sombre circle to a little crowd. They thronged upon

each other and looked at him, lying there on the miserable prison

bed, in the light of the horrible grated windows, all awe-stricken

in a kind of grey consternation not knowing how to believe it; for

it was a thing unparalleled that one who was condemned should thus

give his executioner the slip. The whisper of the sheriff’s low voice

inquiring into the catastrophe broke the impression a little. “How did

it happen--how was it? Dead! But it seems impossible. Are you sure,

doctor, it is not a faint?”

The doctor waved his hand almost scornfully towards the still and rigid

form. “I foresaw it always; it is--as I thought it would be,” he said.

“His poor mother!” said the clergyman with a sort of habitual,

conventional lamentation, as if it could matter to that poor mother!

Dr. Barrère turned upon him quickly. “Go to them--tell them--it will

save them something,” he said with sudden eagerness. “You can do no

more here.”

“It seems impossible,” the sheriff repeated, turning again to the

bed. “Is there a glass to be had?--anything--hold it to his lips! Do

something, doctor. Have you tried all means? are you sure?” He had no

doubt; but astonishment, and the novelty of the situation, suggested

questions which really required no answer. He touched the dead hand and

shuddered. “It is extraordinary, most extraordinary,” he said.

“I warned you of the possibility from the beginning,” said Dr. Barrère;

“his heart was very weak. It is astonishing rather that he bore the

strain so long.” Then he added with that stern look, “It is better

that it should be so.”

The words were scarcely out of his lips when a sudden commotion was

heard as of some one hurrying along the stony passages, a sound of

voices and hasty steps. The door which, in view of the fatal ceremonial

about to take place, had been left open, was pushed quickly, loudly to

the wall, and an important personage, the Mayor of Poolborough, flushed

and full of excitement, hurried in. “Thank God,” he cried, wiping his

forehead, “thank God, it’s come in time! I knew they could not refuse

us. Here is the reprieve come at last.”

A cry, a murmur rose into the air from all the watchers. Who could

help it? The reprieve--at such a moment! This solemn mockery was more

than human nerves could bear. The warder who had been poor Jim’s chief

guardian broke forth into a sudden loud outburst, like a child’s, of

crying. The sheriff could not speak. He pointed silently to the bed.

But of all the bystanders none was moved like Dr. Barrère. He fell

backward as if he had received a blow, and gazed at the mayor

speechless, his under lip dropping, his face livid, heavy drops coming

out upon his brow. It was not till he was appealed to in the sudden

explanations that followed that the doctor came to himself. When he

was addressed he seemed to wake as from a dream, and answered with

difficulty; his lips parched, his throat dry, making convulsive efforts

to moisten his tongue, and enunciate the necessary words. “Heart

disease--feared all the time--” he said, as if he had partly lost that

faculty of speech. The mayor looked sharply at him, as if suspecting

something. What was it? intoxication? So early, and at such a time? But

Dr. Barrère seemed to have lost all interest in what was proceeding. He

cared nothing for their looks. He cared for nothing in the world. “I’m

of no further use here,” he said huskily, and went toward the door as

if he were blind, pushing against one and another. When he had reached

the door, however, he turned back. “The poor fellow,” he said, “the

poor--victim was to be given to his family after--. It was a favour

granted them. The removal was to be seen to--to-night; there is no

reason for departing from that arrangement, I suppose?”

The officials looked at each other, not knowing what to say, feeling

that in the unexpected catastrophe there was something which demanded

a change, yet unable on the spur of the moment to think what it was.

Then the mayor replied faltering, “I suppose so. It need not make any

change, do you think? The poor family--have enough to bear without,

vexing them with alterations. Since there can be--no doubt--” He paused

and looked, and shuddered. No doubt, oh, no doubt! The execution would

have been conducted with far less sensation. It was strange that such

a shivering of horror should overwhelm them to see him lying so still

upon that bed.

“Now I must go--to my rounds,” the doctor said. He went out, buttoning

up his coat to his throat, as if he were shivering too, though it was

a genial September morning, soft and warm. He went out from the dark

prison walls into the sunshine like a man dazed, passing the horrible

preparations on his way, the coffin! from which he shrank as if it had

been a monster. Dr. Barrère’s countenance was like that of a dead man.

He walked straight before him as if he were going somewhere; but he

went upon no rounds; his patients waited for him vainly. He walked and

walked till fatigue of the body produced a general stupor, aiding and

completing the strange collapse of the mind, and then mechanically, but

not till it was evening, he went home. His housekeeper, full of anxious

questions, was silenced by the look of his face, and had his dinner

placed hastily and silently upon the table, thinking the agitation of

the day had been too much for him. Dr. Barrère neither ate nor drank,

but he fell into a heavy and troubled sleep at the table, where he had

seated himself mechanically. It was late when he woke, and dark, and

for a moment there was a pause of bewilderment and confusion in his

mind. Then he rose, went to his desk and took some money out of it, and

his cheque-book. He took up an overcoat as he went through the hall.

He did not so much as hear the servant’s timid question as to when he

should return. When he should return!

After the body of poor Jim had been brought back to his mother’s house

and all was silent there, in that profound hush after an expected

calamity which is almost a relief, Agnes, not able to rest, wondering

in her misery why all that day her lover had not come near them, had

not sent any communication, but for the first time had abandoned them

in their sorrow, stood for a moment by the window in the hall to look

if, by any possibility, he might still be coming. He might have been

detained by some pressing call. He had neglected everything for Jim; he

might now be compelled to make up for it--who could tell? Some reason

there must be for his desertion. As she went to the window, which was

on a level with the street, it gave her a shock beyond expression to

see a pallid face close to it looking in--a miserable face, haggard,

with eyes that were bloodshot and red, while everything else was

the colour of clay--the colour of death. It was with difficulty she

restrained a scream. She opened the window softly and said:

“Arnold! you have come at last!” The figure outside shrank and

withdrew, then said, “Do not touch me--don’t look at me. I did it: to

save him the shame--”

“Arnold, come in, for God’s sake! Don’t speak so--Arnold--”

“Never, never more! I thought the reprieve would not come. I did it.

Oh, never, never more!”

“Arnold!” she cried, stretching out her hands. But he was gone. Opening

the door as quickly as her trembling would let her, the poor girl

looked out into the dark street, into the night: but there was no one

there.

Was it a dream, a vision, an illusion of exhausted nature, unable to

discern reality from imagination? No one ever knew; but from that

night Dr. Barrère was never seen more in Poolborough, nor did any of

those who had known him hear of him again. He disappeared as if he had

never been. And if that was the terrible explanation of it, or if the

sudden shock had maddened him, or if it was really he that Agnes saw,

no one can tell. But it was the last that was ever heard or seen of Dr.

Barrère.

MARGARET OLIPHANT.

X

A WILL AND A WAY.

IT WAS in that pleasant season of the year when there is a ladder at

every apple-tree, and every man met on the road is driving with his

left hand and eating a red apple from his right. At this season, as

regularly as the year rolled round, old Carshena Hubblestone nearly

died of cramps, caused by gorging himself with apples that fell almost

into his mouth from the spreading boughs of fruit trees that fairly

roofed his low-built house. This was, as it were, Carshena’s one

dissipation. The apples cost him nothing, and his medical attention

after his bouts cost him nothing either, for he was the son of a

physician, and though his father was long since dead, the village

doctor would not render a bill.

“Crow don’t eat crow,” Dr. Michel answered, roughly, when Carshena

weakly asked him what he owed. The chance of thus roistering so cheaply

is not presented to every man, and reluctance to let such a bargain

pass was perhaps what helped to lend periodicity to the old man’s

attacks. Dr. Michel always held that this was his chief incentive, and,

be this as it might, it was very certain that apples and bargains were

the only two things on earth for which Carshena was ever known to show

a weakness, creditable or discreditable. Most small communities have

their rich men and their mean men, but in the village of Leonard the

two were one.

As the years passed on and Carshena’s head whitened, it naturally

grew to be a less and less easy task for Dr. Michel to bring his

patient back to the place where he had been before apples ripened.

If the situation had not tickled a spice of humor that lay under

the physician’s grim exterior he would have refused these autumnal

attentions. As it was he confined himself to futile warnings and

threats of non-attendance, but he always did obey the summons when it

came. The townsfolk of Leonard would all have taken the same humorous

view of this weakness of Carshena’s but for the trouble which it gave

his too-good sister Adelia--liked and pitied by every one. Adelia

nursed her brother in each attack with a tenderness and anxiety that

aggravated all the community. Nobody but his sister Adelia was ever

anxious over Carshena. It was, therefore, like a bolt from a clear sky

when, in this chronicled autumn, the following conversation took place

at the Hubblestones’ gate. Dr. Michel’s buggy was wheeling out to the

main road as Mr. Gowan, the town butcher, was about to drive through

the gateway.

“Well, doctor,” called the genial man of blood, a broad grin on his

round face, “how’s the patient?”

“He’s gone, sir,” said Dr. Michel, drawing rein. The butcher drew up

his horse sharply, his ruddy face changing so suddenly that the doctor

laughed outright.

“Gone!” echoed Mr. Gowan. “Not gone?”

“Yes, sir, as I warned him time and again he would go.”

The butcher shook his head and pursed his lips, the news slowly

penetrating his mind. “Well, I certainly would hate to die of eatin’

apples,” he said at last.

“I guess you’ll find you hate to die of anything, when the time comes,”

said the more experienced physician. “Carshena,” he added, “got nothing

he didn’t bring on himself, if that’s any comfort to him.”

“Don’t speak hard of the dead, doctor,” he urged. “We’ve all got to

follow him some day. He wasn’t a nice man in some ways, Carshena

wasn’t, but--”

“He was a nasty old man in most ways,” snapped the doctor.

“Don’t say such things now, doctor, don’t,” urged his companion. “Ain’t

he paid in his full price, whatever his sins was? Poor soul! he can’t

be worse’n dead.”

“Oh, yes, he can, and for one I believe he is,” interrupted the doctor.

His crisp white hair seemed to Mr. Gowan to curl tighter over his head

as he frowned with some thought he was nursing. “You haven’t seen the

will I had to witness this morning!” he burst out. “Just you wait a

little! Upon my soul! the more I think of it the madder I get! It’s out

of my bailiwick, but if I were a lawyer I’d walk right up now under

those old apple-trees yonder, and before that man was cold on his bed

I’d have his sister’s promise to break his old will into a thousand

splinters! Wait till you hear it. Good-morning.”

When the will was read and its contents announced, the town of Leonard,

including its butcher, took the doctor’s view to a man.

“A brute,” said Dr. Michel, hotly, “who has let his old sister work

her hands to the bone for him, and then turned her off like some old

worn-out horse, has, in my opinion, no right to a will at all. How

about setting this will aside in his sister’s interests, judge?”

A little convocation of the leading spirits of Leonard were met

together in Dr. Michel’s office to discuss the matter of Carshena’s

will, and what should be done with Adelia, cast on the charity of the

village. Judge Bowles, when appealed to, raised his mild blue eyes and

looked around the company.

“Adelia,” he said, “is the best sister I ever knew. Had the man no

shame?”

“Shame!” said the town’s barber, with a reminiscent chuckle; “why, he

came into my parlors one day and asked me if I’d cut the back of his

hair for twelve cents, and let him cut the front himself; and I did it,

for the joke of the thing! He saved thirteen cents that way.”

“Gentlemen, gentlemen!” demurred the judge; but amid the general

laughter the tax-gatherer’s voice rose:

“There isn’t a tax he didn’t fight. This town got nothing out of

Carshena Hubblestone that he could help paying; and now he leaves us

his relatives to support.”

Judge Bowles rose to his feet.

“Gentlemen,” he said, in mild but earnest rebuke, “the man is dead. We

all know what his character was without these distressing particulars.

It is entirely true that we owe him nothing, but a dead man is

defenceless, and his will is his will, and law is law. Did you ever

think what a solemn title a man’s last will is? It means just what it

says, gentlemen--his last will, his last wish and power of disposition

writ down on paper, concerning his own property. It’s a solemn thing to

break that.”

“A man’s no business having such a will and a disposition to write it

down on paper,” said the doctor. “What were the exact terms of the

will, judge?”

“Very simple,” said Judge Bowles, dryly. “The whole estate is to be

sold, and the entire proceeds, every cent realized, except what is

kept back for repairs and care, is to be applied to the purchase of

a suitable lot and the raising of a great monument over the mortal

remains of Carshena Hubblestone.”

“While his sister starves!” added Dr. Michel.

“Gee!” exclaimed the kindly butcher. He had heard all this before, but

thus repeated it seemed to strike him anew, as somehow it did all the

rest of the company. They sat looking at each other in silence, with

indrawings of the breath and compression of lips.

“There is this extenuating circumstance,” said the doctor, with

dangerous smoothness; “our lamented brother was aware that unless he

erected a monument to himself he might never enjoy one. We--the judge,

Mr. Gowan, and myself--are made sole executors under the will--without

pay. In Carshena’s life Adelia was his white slave. In his death,

doubtless, he felt he could trust her to make no protest. I wish you

could have seen her with him as I have, gentlemen. I shall call it a

shame upon us if we let her eat the bitter bread of our charity. She’s

been put upon and trodden down, but she’s still a proud woman in her

way, and we’ve got to save her from a bitter old age. We’ve got to do

it.”

“It’s the kind of thing that discourages one’s belief in humanity,”

said the judge, in a lowered tone. “This affair might be only absurd if

it weren’t for the sister’s share in it. As it is, it’s a revelation of

human selfishness that makes one heart-sick.”

Dr. Michel’s laugh rang out irreverently.

“It’s perfectly absurd, sister or no sister,” he said. “Nobody, not one

of us, loved Carshena in life--though I think now we didn’t hate him

half enough--and here in death he’s fixed it so the town’s got to pay

for his responsibilities while his money builds him a grand monument!

I call that about as absurd as you’ll get anywhere. I’ll grant you

it makes me downright sick at my stomach, judge, but it don’t touch

my heart. No, sir. Keep your organs separate, as I do, gentlemen.

There’s one thing certain”--he drew the eyes of his audience with

uplifted finger--”if we can’t outwit this will somehow, we’ll be the

laughing-stock of this whole county. I don’t care a snap of my finger

if Carshena has a monument as high as Haman’s gallows, if only his

sister is protected at the same time.”

“Well, short of breaking the will, what would you suggest, doctor?”

asked Judge Bowles, with a little stiffness. He had not liked the

familiar discourse on his organs, but the doctor did not care. The

judge was ruffled at last, which was exactly what he desired.

“Suggest?” he cried, laughing. “I don’t know; but I know there never

was a will written that couldn’t be driven through with a coach and six

if the right man sits on the box. You’re the lawyer, judge.”

The judge was a lawyer, as he then and there proceeded to prove. He

rose to his feet and spoke in his old-fashioned style:

“Gentlemen, I think I speak for this company when I say that we

strongly object to the breaking of this will as a bad precedent

in the community. We wish it carried out to the very letter. Our

fellow-townsman knew his sister’s needs better than we, and he chose to

leave her needy. There are many, many things this town sorely wants, as

he also knew, but he chose to use his money otherwise. What a monument

to him it would have been had he built us the new school-house our

town requires! The wet south lot down by the old mill is an eyesore

to the village. Had he used that land and drained it and set up a

school-house there, or indeed any public building, what a different

meeting this would have been! He was our only man of wealth, and he

leaves not so much as a town clock to thank him for. No; a monument to

_himself_ is what his will calls for, and a monument he shall have.

If we failed him here, which of us would feel sure that our own wills

would be carried out? In the confidence of these four walls we can say

that the difficulties of the inscription and the style of monument seem

insuperable. I know but one man to whom I would intrust this delicate

commission. I feel confident that he would not render us too absurd by

too conspicuous a monument or too florid an inscription. Need I name

Dr. Michel?”

“Out of my bailiwick,” cried the doctor--”’way out of my bailiwick.”

But his voice was drowned in the confusion of the popular acclaim that

was forming him into a committee of one. The kindly butcher made his

way to the doctor’s side under cover of the noise.

“Take it, doctor; now do take it,” he whispered in his ear. “There

ain’t a man in the town that can shave this pig if you can’t. I was

sayin’ just yesterday you’re lost in this little place of ourn. You’ve

got more sense than’s often called for here. Here’s the chance for you

to show ‘em what you can do. Do take it.”

The physician looked at the wheedling little butcher with a glance from

his blue eye that was half kindly, half irritated. “Well, I’ll take

it,” he cried; “I’ll take it; and I thank you for your confidence,

gentlemen.”

It was a full month before the little company met again in the doctor’s

office, but during that period they knew Dr. Michel had not been idle

in the matter intrusted to his care. He was seen in close conversation

with the town’s first masons, the best carpenters, the local architect,

and these worthies, under close and eager examination, gave answers

that dashed the unspoken hopes of those who questioned. Here were

_bona fide_ bids asked for on so much masonry, so much carpentering,

and the architect had been ordered to send in designs of monuments,

how high he deemed it unprofessional to state; but arguing inversely,

they judged by the length of his countenance that the measurements were

not short--he had particularly hated Carshena. It was, for all these

reasons, a rather anxious-looking company that met in Dr. Michel’s

office at his summons, and the doctor’s own face was not reassuring as

he opened the meeting.

“Well, gentlemen,” he said, slowly, “it’s a thankless task you’ve given

me, but such as it is, I hope you will find I have performed it to your

satisfaction. Here are various plans for the monument to be erected to

our late fellow-citizen, and here is a plan of the ground that it has

seemed to me most suitable to purchase. It has been a task peculiarly

uncongenial to me, because I, I suppose, know more than any of you here

how this money is needed where it ought to have gone. I saw Adelia

yesterday, and lonely and ghost-ridden as that old house would be to

any of us, it’s a home to her that’s to be sold over her head to build

this.” He laid his hand on the papers he had thrown down on the table

before him. The little company looked silently at each other, with

faces as downcast as if they were to blame. It was Judge Bowles who

spoke first.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “we must not let ourselves feel too responsible

in this matter. We are only following our plain duty. Show us the

monument which you consider best, doctor.”

The doctor was silently turning over the papers. “Family feeling is a

queer thing,” he said, meditatively. “I saw Adelia the other day, and I

asked her if she wanted a neighbor to sleep in the house at night.

“’There’s nothing here for robbers to take, Dr. Michel,’ she said;

‘and if it’s ghosts you think I’m afraid of, I only wish from my heart

ghosts would come back to visit me. Everybody of my blood is dead.’”

“It’s very pitiful,” said Judge Bowles, slowly.

The doctor turned on him instantly. “Do you seem to feel now that you

could countenance breaking the will, judge?”

“No,” said the judge, shortly, as one who whistles to keep his courage

up.

The doctor’s fingers drummed on the table as he paused thoughtfully.

“Carshena,” he said, “if you can believe me, measured out the kerosene

oil he allowed for each week on Monday; and when it gave out they

went to bed at dusk, if it gave out on Friday night. But one thing

Adelia did manage to do. So long as a drop of oil was in the measure a

light stood in a window that lit up the ugly turn in the county road

round the corner of their house. I know her light saved me from a bad

collision once; some of you also, perhaps. She’s kept that little lamp

so clean it always shone like a jewel up there. The window-pane it

shone through had never a speck on it either. That’s what I call public

spirit. And it’s public spirit, too, that makes her keep sweet-smelling

flowers growing on the top of the old road wall. In summer I always

drive past there slowly to enjoy them. When she comes on the charity

of the town she may console herself by remembering these things. She

did what she could (in spite of Carshena), and nobody can do more. Here

are the plans for his monument, gentlemen. I would like to have your

vote on them.”

The little company, as if glad to move, drew about the table as the

doctor opened out the plans in a row. The butcher, whose ruddy face

looked dim in his disappointment, and whose despondent chin hung down

on his white shirt bosom, picked up one of the designs gingerly and

examined it.

“Are they all alike, doctor?” he asked.

Judge Bowles looked over Mr. Gowan’s shoulder.

“Each design seems to be a hollow shaft of some kind, with a round

opening at the top,” he said, and looked inquiringly over his glasses

at the doctor, who nodded assent.

“They are all hollow. You seem to get more for your money so. The round

opening at the top of the shaft can be filled with anything we choose

later. I might suggest a crystal with the virtues of the deceased

inscribed on it. Then, if we keep a light burning behind the glass at

night, those virtues will shine before us by night and by day.”

Judge Bowles lifted his eyes quickly. The doctor’s face was

unpleasantly satiric, and his blue eyes looked out angrily from under

his curling white hair. Judge Bowles sat down, leaning back heavily in

his chair, his perplexed eyes still on Dr. Michel’s frowning brow. Mr.

Gowan, with a look as near anger as he could achieve, moved to a seat

behind the stove. His idol was failing him utterly. He felt he himself

could have done better than this. Dr. Michel’s roving eyes glanced

round the circle of dissatisfied and dismayed faces, and then for the

first time he seemed to break from his indifference:

“This is all very well, gentlemen--very well indeed. The facts are,

you gave me a commission, and bound me to fulfill it strictly and

to the letter, and now you are dissatisfied because I have followed

your wishes. What did you expect? If you had left the matter to me

without restrictions, I should certainly have tried to break the will,

as I told you. Briefly, here is my report. We shall have about twenty

thousand dollars all told to invest in a monument over our lamented

brother. Any one of these hollow masonry structures here will cost

about ten thousand dollars. As to the purchase of a suitable lot,

which the will directs, I think even Carshena would declare it a good

bargain to pay nothing whatever for the land, and that I can arrange,

I believe. I have good reason to suppose”--he began to speak very

slowly--”that the town would, without price, allow us to erect this

monument on that unsightly bit of wet land to the south, near the old

mill, if we in turn will agree to drain the grounds, keep them in good

order, plant flowers and shrubbery, and further promise to keep a light

burning all night in an opening at the top of the monument. I spoke

of a crystal set in that opening, with the virtues of the deceased

inscribed upon it, but we can, if we choose, carve those same virtues

in the more imperishable stone below, and print something else--a clock

face perhaps--on the crystal above. That’s a mere minor detail.”

Judge Bowles, whose gaze had been growing more and more bewildered, now

started in his chair and sat suddenly upright. He stared at the doctor

uncertainly. The doctor cast a quick look at him, and went on rapidly:

“If you will allow me, I’ll make my report quickly, and leave it with

you. I have a great deal to do this morning in other directions. It has

occurred to me that as the base of the monument is to be square and

hollow, it would be easy to fit it into a comfortable living-room, with

one, or perhaps two, small rooms built about it. I have not mentioned

this to the architect, but I know it can be done. The will especially

directs that repairs and care be allowed for.” The doctor was talking

rapidly now. “The monument will not cost more than ten thousand, the

clock about two. Twelve thousand from twenty thousand leaves eight

thousand. The yearly interest on eight thousand and the fact that we

could offer free residence in the monument should let us engage a

reliable resident keeper, who would give the time and attention that

such a monument and such a park would need.”

The doctor paused, and again looked about him.

The whole circle of faces looked back at him curiously--some

with a puzzled gaze, but several, including Judge Bowles, with a

half-fascinated, half-dismayed air. Mr. Gowan alone preserved his look

of utter hopelessness.

“Who’d take a job like that?” he said, gloomily. “I wouldn’t, for one,

live in a vault with Carshena, dead or alive.”

“Oh, the grave could be outside, and the monument as a kind of monster

head-stone,” said the doctor pleasantly. “My idea was to have the grave

well outside. Four or five hundred and a home isn’t much to offer a

man, gentlemen, but I happen to know a very respectable elderly woman

who would, it seems to me, suit us exactly as well as a man. In fact,

I think it would considerably add to the picturesque features of our

little town park to have a resident female keeper. I think I see

her now, sitting in the summer sunshine at the door of this unique

head-stone monument, or in winter independently luxuriating in its warm

and hospitable shelter. I see her winding the clock, affectionately

keeping the grave like a gorgeous flower-bed, caring for the shrubbery,

burnishing the clock lamp till it shines like a jewel, as she well

knows how to do, and best of all in her case, gentlemen, I happen to

know from her own lips that she has no fear of ghosts. Why, gentlemen,

what’s the matter? I protest, gentlemen.”

At that moment Mr. Gowan might be said to be the doctor’s only

audience. The rest of the company were engaged in whispering to each

other, or speechlessly giving themselves over to suppressed and unholy

glee. Judge Bowles was openly wiping his eyes and shaking in his chair.

Dr. Michel looked around the circle with resentful surprise.

“You seem amused, gentlemen!” he said, with dignity; and then

addressing himself to Mr. Gowan exclusively, as if that gentleman alone

were worthy to be his listener, “Would you object to a woman as keeper,

Mr. Gowan?”

“What’s her name?” asked the butcher.

A roar of laughter, not to be long suppressed, drowned his words.

Mr. Gowan looked about the shaken circle, stared for a moment, then

suddenly, as comprehension, like a breaking dawn, spread over his round

face, he brought his hand down hard on his fat knee.

“Well, doctor,” he roared, in admiration too deep for laughter, “if you

ain’t the dawgornest!”

The doctor’s wiry hair seemed to rise and spread as wings, his eyes

snapped and twinkled, his mouth puckered. “Will some one embody this

in the form of a motion?” he asked, gravely. The judge dried his eyes,

and, with difficulty, rose to his feet.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “I move that we build this monument with a base

large enough for a suite of rooms inside; that we set this structure

on the lot which our good doctor has chosen; that we ornament it with

an illuminated clock at the top; and further, that--that this female

keeper be appointed.”

“Seconded, by Harry!” roared Mr. Gowan.

The doctor, with his hands on his hips, his body thrown far back,

looked with the eye of a conqueror over the assembly. “Those in favor

of the motion will please say Aye; those opposed No. It seems to be

carried! it is carried,” he recited in one rapid breath.

“Amen!” endorsed Mr. Gowan, fervently.

And this warm approval of their butcher was in the end echoed as

cordially by the most pious citizens of Leonard. After the first shock

of their surprise was over, natural misgivings were lost in enjoyment

of the grim humor of this very practical jest of their good doctor’s,

that visitors now actually stop over a train to see. Many a village has

its park, and many a one its illuminated clock; it was left for Leonard

to have in its park a grave kept like a gorgeous flower-bed, and at

the grave’s head a towering monument that is at once a tombstone, an

illuminated clock and a residence.

Who the next keeper may be it is one of the amusements of Leonard to

imagine. The present keeper is a happy old woman, whose fellow-citizens

like nothing better than to see her winding the clock, caring for the

flowers, burnishing the town lamp; in summer sitting in the sunshine at

the door of the head-stone monument, in winter luxuriating in that warm

and independent shelter.

“I feel as if Carshena knew just what was best for me, after all,

doctor,” she said to her physician, in his first call upon her in her

new home; and that worthy, with a nod of his white head, assented in

the readiest manner.

“Doubtless, madam, doubtless,” he said, “Carshena had all this in

mind when he made me his executor. Didn’t you, Carshena?” He winked

his eye genially at the grave as he passed out, and with no shade of

uncertainty or repentance in his mind, climbed into his buggy and went

on his satisfied way.

MARGARET SUTTON BRISCOE.

XI

DOCTOR ARMSTRONG.

I.

COLVIN ARMSTRONG tried to take up his pen with an air of happiness and

relief, for it was the last chapter of his great work which he was

about to commence. But the effort failed, and he leaned back in his

chair, thoroughly tired out--too jaded to be brisk or energetic.

It was not his professional work that tired him. A London surgeon, with

a magnificent reputation, he had more than enough to do; but he was

only forty, and his constitution was of iron. Work agreed with him: it

was Thought that utterly prostrated him at times. No sooner was his

last engagement fulfilled, or his last patient despatched, than he

retired to his library and gave himself up to the great psychological

problem that racked his brains. Night brought a short relief: he slept

from twelve till six; but morning renewed his wrestlings, and it was

only the necessity of attending to his surgery that freed him from the

incessant train of thought. Would that his head were as cool as his

strong, firm hands!

It was the Mystery of Human Pain that was haunting him. Until two years

back he had never given such questions a thought, but then the problem

began to force itself upon him. How was it that so many suffered a

living martyrdom, whilst he himself never knew a moment’s pain? How

was it that, having no personal knowledge of pain, he nevertheless

felt such an overpowering sympathy with those who suffered, and had

such an instinctive inborn gift of giving relief? And then the larger,

less personal questions: Was there any guiding hand allotting pain to

innocent mortals? Were they really innocent? If there was design in

it all, from whom came the design, and what was its purpose? Was it

for good, or evil, or both? If no Providence guided humanity, what was

the origin of pain? Why was it allowed to be? And so on, in an endless

train of thought, one problem suggesting ten others, till the subject

broadened out to the doors of Eternity itself, and the mind reeled

before its own imaginings.

[Illustration: _VACCINATING THE BABY_]

Armstrong flew to his books for assistance, and primed himself with the

ideas of the metaphysicians; but he was not satisfied, and a strong

impulse led him to try his own hand at solving the mystery. Gradually,

after much hard reading and thinking, he evolved a theory which, though

far from satisfactory, seemed ampler and better than the ideas of the

old philosophers; and then, slowly and laboriously, he committed it to

paper. As the work grew, he became more convinced of the truth which

seemed to lurk in his views, the foundation of real discovery on which

his theses were based. Something of his marvellous insight into disease

and distortion seemed to have entered into the book, and he was eager

to give it to the world.

So this was the last chapter! By Jove! how hot and close the room

was! It was annoying to feel so dull and listless, but there was

some excuse: nine o’clock at night is not a time when a man is at

his freshest, and there was nothing so wearing as this closely woven

intellectual work, where every thread had to be followed to its end,

every detail thought out, every possible ramification explored, and

the mind kept at its highest tension throughout, straining to cover

the whole ground and to order in logical sequence its myriad elusive

thoughts. Difficult? Why, there was nothing to compare to it! But what

was the good of magnifying troubles? Here was the final chapter, the

conclusion which was to be so masterly, already mapped out in his mind,

only waiting to be transferred to paper. Armstrong wiped his damp

forehead, and seized the pen. The room was lit as he liked it, with

only a lamp casting a subdued light on his desk; the rest in deepest

gloom. Now was the time to begin. But he was terribly tired.

* * * * *

Kr-rk!

Armstrong leaned back in his chair, and pressed his hand to his head.

Something inside seemed to have broken with a snap, or a tiny shutter

had fallen away, as in a camera, revealing a hidden lens in his brain.

His head was clearer and freer, as if some clogging veil had suddenly

been removed, and before his eyes there burned a new light, steady and

cold, but brilliant. A cooler, purer air filled the room. The present

melted away from his vision. * * * * *

Far away--so far that everything was dwarfed, but yet as distinct in

every detail as though it had been close at hand--Armstrong saw a

vision.

A dark underground dungeon, with damp standing in beads on its bare

stone walls; a man, bound, gagged, and helpless; another, black-masked

and sullen of movement; a third, seated on a small platform, with

his face in shadow. A feeble hanging lamp, swaying to and fro in the

draughts of the cell, was the only illumination.

The vision came nearer and nearer, and grew larger as it came, until it

reached Armstrong and filled his room, and he felt the dank breath of

the dungeon stir his hair. He looked again: the masked man was at his

elbow, the man on the dais was above him--unrecognisable in the shadow,

but smiling gently; that much he could see. Then he looked at the

third man, the prisoner; and a thrill of dread went through him, for

he recognised himself,--in old-world, long-forgotten garb, but still

himself. And then the whole grew real, with a deadly reality; he was no

more a mere spectator, but a part of the vision, and the vision was a

part of his own existence. The chill of the room fell on his spirit,

filling him with vague, horrible forebodings: the present mingled with

the past, and his spirit passed into the limp, helpless figure on the

rack. He--he himself, and none other--was the victim in the torture

chamber, and the world was black around him.

There was a clank of steel on the floor, as though little instruments

had been dropped, and then a sudden sharp pang struck him from an

unseen source. Another, another, and yet another,--a very multitude of

keen stabbing pangs. In uncontrollable agony he raised his voice to

shout with pain, but the gag stopped him, choked him, throttled his

curses. And the dark figure smiled from above.

Then came hot, burning, throbbing pains that shot through him, turning

the blood in his veins to fire, and gnawing his vitals till they

consumed away. He tried to turn, to roll, to ease himself in any way;

but he was bound and rigid and helpless, and his efforts only increased

the torture. And still the figure sat motionless above him. He turned

his streaming eyes upwards in mute appeal, and his answer was a smile.

Then the sharp pains and the burning misery ceased for a while, and

his aching limbs rested, and all seemed over. But the presiding fiend

waved a silent signal, and worse came--stretching, straining torture,

that nearly pulled the wretched frame asunder (well if it had!), and

dull grinding agonies, worse than the sharper pains, more cruel and

relentless than the stabs or blows or thrusts.

And then the worst of all--the whole in combination. Crushing,

grinding, distorting, straining, breaking, bending, blinding, burning,

flaying, racking, stabbing--more than the mind can picture or words

describe--in turn and together, and all the more horrible, coming

unseen and sudden and unawares. Crush and rack and burn and grind, till

the brain was on fire and the body groaning under its burdens; till

the face was furrowed with tears of agony, the whole frame shapeless

and broken, limbs useless, muscles tortured, twisted and crushed,

nerves shattered, and the spirit within flaming with miserable,

hopeless hate. Madness? No; that had come in the first silent moments

of fear and pain, but the cruel hand had driven it away, and now there

was only PAIN--deep, unfathomable Pain.

Then came a low whisper, the cool breath of Death waiting softly

outside the chamber, and the wounded soul fluttered for a moment in

joyous answer. But the human fiend above knew it, and the torture

stopped. Sore, blistered, broken, and useless, he was flung aside to

endure still longer in his misery, and Death turned sighing away.

* * * * *

Armstrong sprang from his chair with curses on his tongue and fury in

his heart, and grasped convulsively at the retreating vision. But it

was far, far off, and melting slowly into air.

Then a great calm fell upon him, and he knew what he had seen. It was

a scene from a former life--his last existence--and it was vouchsafed

to him as a lesson, a glimpse of the everlasting order of life. The

inspiration of a great Message glowed on his brow and in his soul. And

this was the Message which he read, clear as the words of a seer:--

“For inasmuch as thou hast suffered pain and bitterness of spirit in

the past, so shalt thou now know freedom from such; and to thee it

shall be given, by thy past sufferings, to discern and make lighter the

grievous burdens of thy fellow-men. And the pain that thou hast felt

in thy veins shall give thee understanding above all others, that thou

mayest cure man’s infirmities and heal the sick of his house.”

II.

The light of a great revelation dazzled Armstrong for a while, but

he rose from it with renewed strength and hope and courage, resolved

to devote himself more than ever to the healing art. And first

he destroyed his manuscript, for his theories were shattered and

forgotten. The mystery of human pain was still unsolved; but was it

for him to solve it? Providence had given him another mission,--to

heal and cure. And Providence had given him the clue to one mystery,

at all events--his own great sympathy with sufferers and insight into

suffering. Sometimes he wondered whether another revelation would

follow; but none came, and he pursued his usual career, doing good

and working hard. The idle speculations, the restless quest of secret

things, which had haunted him and wearied him before, were now of the

past, and he lived for work alone.

But more was to come--unexpectedly and without warning.

It was an ordinary case he was treating: brain surgery. The man,

a wretched creature, suffered severely, and was in a broken state

of health; Armstrong had traced it to brain pressure, and saw his

way easily to put things right by a cerebral operation. He was just

concluding an examination, and the patient lay quietly in the great

chair, soothed by a slight injection of morphia. Armstrong turned away

to get a light--it was five o’clock on an autumn day, just beginning

to grow dark--when suddenly there came that strange grating “Kr-rk” in

his head, and he felt the room whirl around him. He clutched hard at

a table near him, but it receded from his grasp and he felt himself

falling down, down, down in giddy helplessness. Then the movement

stopped, and he felt, as before, that some weight had been lifted from

his brain, and a new, unused sense developed in him. But this time

there was no clear light, no pure air, no vision.

What was coming? Something, he felt, was in store--some strange,

new revelation--and he waited eagerly. As the prophets of old were

inspired, so light had come to him, and now perhaps he would learn one

more secret of the troubled world.

But nothing came; all was blank darkness around him, and an uneasy

sense of foreboding stole slowly over him, till his hand shook and his

face grew damp with cold sweat.

What was that? A far-off mocking laugh? And * * * O God in heaven! Not

_that_ again! Not _that_!

He tried to call again, for pangs worse than of death were racking

him; but something cold was thrust into his mouth and choked him. And

then his eyes, shut tight in the clenched agony of pain, opened again,

and he saw the streaming dungeon walls, the swaying lamp, the masked

torturer, and the grim shadow-figure seated motionless on the dais

above him; and his heart sank within him, and he turned sick and faint.

For one brief moment the masked man turned away--to heat his irons,

perhaps, or rest his arms, weary of their heavy work--and all

Armstrong’s spirit went up in one short, agonised, burning prayer, in

one deep, strenuous remonstrance.

“I have felt it before,” he cried. “I have endured it before, and I

know its meaning. Must I go through all again? Have I failed in my

duty? Save me from pain and madness before it is too late! O God of

cruelty, Pain-giver, merciless, wicked, infernal, save me, save me,

preserve me!”

His words, stifled by the gag, reached no human ear; but in the cell a

new presence was lurking, and on his face fell a hot, quick breath.

A voice spoke in his ear, very soft and gentle and low.

“You blaspheme in vain,” it said; “God has not sent you this vision,

but _I_.”

III.

The torture was over, and Armstrong waited quietly for the moment of

restoration to the world; but it did not come, and a new fear seized

him. What if he never recovered from this state? As the Powers of

Good had vouchsafed him the first vision, so the Powers of Evil had

mocked him with the second--the same as the first, but infinitely

more terrible, for through the former a subtle strength of will had

sustained him, and he had emerged from it wiser, happier, and stronger,

whilst now he felt himself deserted and unaided, and * * * Heavens

above! What would come next? The physical torture was over, but now his

mind was on the rack, and it was worse, far worse!

The two grim figures remained in the cell, motionless as statues. A

strange detachment of mind, a mystic duality of self, was torturing

Armstrong. Here he felt the pangs and achings of the most terrible

pain; yet at the same time he knew that it was all unreal, and his

thoughts turned to the world above--his work, his house, his friends,

the very patient in his chair, waiting and wondering. Somewhere between

the two lay madness, and his spirit cried for peace--a world all

vision, or a world all reality--anything but this perplexing, torturing

union of the two.

Quick as thought came the answer. “Look around before you go.”

It was the soft voice he had heard before--gentle, but insistent. But

he had seen too much of that hateful cell, and he closed his eyes in

tight resistance.

“Look around,” said the voice, even more gently than before.

A shuddering fear seized Armstrong.

The spirit read his thoughts. “You are afraid: you dare not look at

_me_. But you shall not see me. Look!”

He put his hand to his head and covered his eyes with a convulsive

movement.

“Listen!” said the voice. “You have not even seen your enemy. Would you

not know him?”

A cold sickness fell on Armstrong’s spirit, and he shuddered. Why see

the monster who had tortured him, the human fiend who could be nothing

other than repulsive?

Then the voice spoke again, more gently than before.

“Listen! I am the God of Evil, but I befriend you. I pass my hand along

your frame, and the pain leaves you. I touch your eyes with my fingers,

and they open. Look around!”

Armstrong rose, sound and strong. The dungeon was dark, but in its

recesses he could see two cowering figures, striving to hide themselves

from his eyes. One was the masked man; one was the director, the

inquisitor, the author of all his misery.

“See how he hides from you,” whispered the voice. “But you shall not be

denied. TURN!”

The sudden thunder of that last word echoed through the vault, and then

there came a short, sharp, double flash of blinding light. The first

flash showed a crouching, cowering figure in the background, with pale,

set face, and cruel eyes; the second struck Armstrong full in the face

and felled him to the ground.

* * * * *

Dazed and frightened, as after a hideous nightmare, he pulled himself

together. The match he had taken up was still in his hand, and he

turned back, mastering himself with a great effort, to his patient.

He lighted the big burner and turned it full on the chair. The man,

roused from the lethargy of morphia, slowly opened his eyes.

Armstrong staggered back, stifling the cry of horror that rose to his

lips; for in that one glance he saw, clear and unmistakable, the face

of his torturer--reincarnated, but still the same.

IV.

Armstrong turned aside to hide his excitement. After all, then, the

vision had not been in vain: it was the complement of the first; and

now all was clear. The Mystery of Human Pain! His own great book on the

subject! He laughed aloud. All that thought and time and labour had

been wasted, and here was the truth, shown to him in a dream--the truth

that all the world should know. A strange exaltation filled his spirit.

“_I_ suffered pain, and now I reap my reward--strong, happy, a healer

of wounds, myself knowing no suffering. _He_ inflicted pain and

torture, and now he suffers for it.”

The patient in the chair moved uneasily and groaned. Armstrong went on:

“A righteous Judge rewards me for what I have undergone, and scourges

him for the evil he has wrought.”

“The Lord have Mercy on his Soul!”

It was a deep voice that spoke, the words booming and reverberating

like the notes of heavy bells. It touched a new chord in Armstrong’s

mind, and sent the blood throbbing and pulsing through his head. “The

Lord have mercy on his soul!” Why? What mercy had _he_ had for others?

And with that the fury of hate returned to him and surged through his

veins, till he felt himself more demon than man. Every pang, every

pain, every racking agony that he had suffered in those two terrible

visions, returned to him threefold, burned into his soul, branded on

every limb and sinew. Curse him with the curse of the martyr, and blast

him with the breath of his iniquities!

And then a cold, unnatural calm fell upon Armstrong, and his quivering

hands grew steady and cunning as before.

* * * * *

It was all so easy! The man lay there, half conscious--with enough

sensation left to feel every torture inflicted on him, but yet unable

to speak or groan. It was a carefully managed anæsthetic, administered

just sufficiently to glaze the eyes and paralyze the tongue, but no

more. And the brain lay so near at hand!

The mad fury of revenge had left Armstrong, and he was cold, scientific

and deliberate--no movement hurried, no torment left untried, and all

done with the mechanical, even touch of the skilled workman. A pang for

a pang, a stab for a stab, a scald for a scald; Armstrong remembered

each pain he had endured, and paid it back threefold. On the subtle

mechanism of the head he played as on a keyed instrument, sending hot,

shooting pains, and dull, numbing clutches, to the remotest parts of

the wretched frame.

All the poor worn nerves centered within his grasp, and to his eyes

they were visible throughout their hidden course, coming to one common

end, where he grasped them as with a handle, and turned and ground

and twisted and crushed, till they stretched, strained, groaned and

quivered under his racking touch. He hissed taunting words in his

ears--words that he knew could not be answered; he mocked at the

helpless agony. And all the while he watched the blue lips, striving to

curse and moan, but bound by the hellish drug as with a gag; and the

bloodshot, straining eyes, too fixed even to appeal; and the dumb agony

of the whole wretched form. And a grim, silent laughter shook him.

But it could not last forever: his hand wearied, and his head reeled.

He fell to the ground in a swoon. * * *

Bells were ringing--light, airy, joyous bells; and he roused himself.

The bells grew slower, fainter--died out altogether--and in their place

a voice was in his ears, very soft and low. What was it saying? It was

so faint, so indistinct * * *

“On _your_ soul may the Lord have mercy!”

Armstrong rose as from a dream. In the chair lay a shape, not mangled,

indeed, but pale-faced, shrunken, distorted, horrible. He bent his head

down and listened to the heart; there were two feeble beats, a faint

flicker, and then it stopped.

There was a strange catch in the surgeon’s breath. The room was hot and

close; he pushed the curtains back, and looked out. It was night now--a

deep blue sky, studded with a myriad stars. And one star shot upwards

in a blaze of silver light.

Armstrong turned away, breathing heavily. There was the body still, and

there were the little instruments he had used.

The present did not stir him, gave him no thought; but the knowledge of

the future was upon him, and he groaned aloud in the new-born agony of

his soul. For he knew what he had done: it was his chance, and he had

missed it; it was his trial, his ordeal, and he had failed * * * And in

the next life on earth his torture would be longer and harder to bear.

The Lord would have no mercy on his soul.

D. L. B. S.

XII

DR. WYGRAM’S SON.

CHAPTER I.

WHEN I met Dr. Clarence Wygram a few weeks ago, I had not seen him

for nearly fifteen years. We were boys at school together, and fast

friends at that time, but our intercourse since then has been very

intermittent. Since he lost his wife in Southern Italy, many years

ago, much of his life has been spent abroad, and, though he is to be

seen in London at intervals, I seldom catch a glimpse of him. We do

not belong to the same set in town, and as, being possessed of an

ample fortune, he has never engaged in practice as a physician, his

wandering and unoccupied life is little akin to my own. We do, however,

meet occasionally by accident, when we talk over old times, vow to see

more of each other in the future, and then part for--perhaps, other

ten years. Such acquaintanceships as this of Wygram and myself are the

most unsatisfactory of all--they can scarcely be called friendships.

Life, in my opinion, is too brief for such unfrequent greetings. It

is important, however, that I recall, for a moment, this penultimate

meeting with my old friend. It happened long ago, but the circumstances

are still fresh in my memory. As I have said, this was our last meeting

but one, and the date some fifteen years ago.

I was about to travel to the North by the night mail, and accidentally

stumbled against Dr. Wygram on the crowded platform at Euston. He is

always pleased to be facetious, when we do chance to see each other,

in regard to our mutually altered appearance since our last meeting,

and predicts, in jocular fashion, that, ere long, we shall certainly

pass without recognition on either side. There is some truth in what he

says, yet, to judge by my friend’s careworn and haggard appearance on

this occasion, I should say he was aging somewhat faster than myself.

It seemed that we were to be fellow-travellers. He also was going

north, though not so far as myself, and I willingly shared a

compartment, which he had already secured for himself and his son, a

stripling youth, apparently about fourteen. The latter was returning to

school after the Easter Holidays, and his father (who, by the way, is

not above the Cockney weakness of calling every big school a college)

was accompanying him on the journey. I remember that, for the first

hour or two, we had enough of conversation to beguile the time. Wygram

had, of course, been abroad--I forget where, or for how long, but we

were quite agreed--we always are, on this point--to view the simple

fact of his absence as being a perfectly sufficient and satisfactory

explanation of the time that has elapsed since our last meeting,

however long that interval may be. After that, our conversation began

to languish. Our old friendship notwithstanding, we have really very

little in common. Having spent a somewhat fatiguing day, I felt

disposed to doze, and I believe that I ultimately slept.

When I awoke, with a start, we were travelling at a high rate of speed.

On the seat directly opposite to mine reclined my young travelling

companion, apparently asleep, the lamplight falling full upon his

upturned face. He seemed to all appearance not very robust; I think

his father had hinted as much to me on the platform before we started.

The boy’s sleep was a somewhat restless one, and he shifted his

position uneasily, as, ever and anon, the oscillation of the carriage

half aroused him. As, only half awake myself, I sat drowsily watching

him, I suddenly became aware that his father, who was looking over

some papers by the aid of a reading lamp at the farther end of the

compartment, seemed to wish, by a sign that he made, that I should join

him. The thought struck me at the time, that perhaps he desired some

conversation with me while his son was not a listener. I accordingly

shifted my travelling rugs, and took a seat opposite to that of my old

friend.

The impression, on my part, that he did not wish the boy to overhear

what he said was partly confirmed when my companion began the

conversation in tones so low as to be barely audible above the rattle

of the train. But I confess that I was somewhat unprepared for the

substance of his communication, even when I did catch his meaning. At

first, what he said was almost unintelligible to me, but at length

I contrived to gather, from what he told me, that some trouble

(affliction, I think, was the word he used) had lately overtaken

him, and he seemed, though indirectly, to appeal to me for sympathy

under his trial. The appeal, however, was entirely indirect, as

no particulars were afforded--at least, if they were, I failed to

understand their meaning. Under these circumstances, I was about to

inquire, as delicately as I could, what the nature of his difficulty

might be, when I chanced to notice that, as he spoke, his eyes would

every now and then wander from looking in my face, and turn, as it

were unconsciously, in the direction of his boy, not apprehensively,

or as if he were afraid of him as a listener, but gently and tenderly,

as if in deep solicitude on his account. This being the case, I

forebore to press the father with questions which might be considered

intrusive. The trouble to which he alluded was perhaps connected with

the lad’s future, perhaps with something else concerning him, anyhow

the secret, whatever it was, seemed to lie in that, or in some other

equally delicate quarter, for Dr. Wygram did not give me any explicit

details--rather avoided doing so, with a reticence quite unlike his

customary frankness. But he had a favour to ask of me. It came to that,

in the end.

“You know,” he said appealingly, “you are my oldest friend--almost my

only friend now, for my wandering life does not gain me new ones, and I

beg you, most earnestly, to aid me, to help me, in this trouble--” Here

he paused as if about to make some disclosure, then, checking himself,

“to counsel me, when I ask you, at a future time.”

Of course, my somewhat pardonable curiosity had no further excuse,

but I murmured that I would be very glad if, at any time, I could be

of service to him. I added that our old friendship justified such

a claim on his part, and that, for my own, I would gladly meet it,

when necessary. I confess I thought that the reserve accompanying his

request was somewhat singular.

“Ah, but promise! promise to me!” (he repeated the word with such

passionate emphasis as to startle me); “promise that if I write you at

any time and ask you to come to my help, you will do it--wherever I may

be.”

This last clause of his request was a tolerably comprehensive one,

as, from the doctor’s well-known migratory habits, the summons might

possibly be indited from Mongolia, or the farthest recesses of

Crim-Tartary. But to pacify him, for I saw that my old friend was

strangely perturbed, I said that I would do what he wished, at any

time, if I could; which latter clause covered the aforesaid difficulty

so far. He seemed relieved by my assurance. His manner grew calmer.

“I cannot tell you more just at present,” he said (this with a glance

at the boy), “except that I am in sore trouble, from which, at another

time, not now, the counsel of a friend may relieve me. It concerns one

near and dear to me” (ah! then the secret did lie there), “and you

are the only one I could trust. Perhaps, in time, my trouble may be

dissipated” (this with a hopeless, sickly smile), “and then you will be

glad I have not bored you with it, but if not, and if I seek fulfilment

of your promise, remember!” With which words he abruptly broke off the

conversation.

Shortly afterwards my fellow-travellers reached their destination.

Dr. Wygram had, by this time, completely recovered his vivacity. When

wishing me good-bye, a silent pressure of the hand, more prolonged

than usual, alone betrayed any recollection, on his part, of our

midnight conversation. I did not recover my own equanimity so rapidly;

the interview came back upon me, as I sat alone for the rest of the

journey, somewhat too vividly for that. A nameless uneasiness possessed

me. I wearied myself with possible explanations of Wygram’s alleged

troubles. Money difficulties were out of the question in the case

of one so well off as he, so simple and unostentatious in his mode

of life, and he would be the last man to gamble. His son--pooh! The

birch was the best cure for boyish peccadilloes, and he would get that

on going back to school. Still, reason with myself as I might, Dr.

Wygram’s nameless trouble remained with me; the boy’s sleeping face

in the lamplight, the father’s urgent entreaty “remember,” these did

not pass away. After all, I would reproach myself for having promised

to obey the summons of my friend whenever it might come; how awkward

that might be! Why could not he, if so anxious for my counsel, arrange

to come to me? Altogether, it was not until several days had elapsed

that I shook off the disagreeable impression left by the journey. As

for Dr. Wygram’s possible summons, I looked for that, more or less

confidently, for several months, then my expectation of its coming

began to fade. As a matter of fact, it did come after all, but not for

fifteen years. Then it came upon this wise. I had been from home for

some days. On returning, a pile of letters awaited me. Sorting them

over one by one, the last in the heap was addressed in an unmistakable

handwriting. “Wygram’s summons at last,” I said to myself, as the mist

of the years rolled away and I was once more travelling northwards in

the train; once more my friend’s voice in my ear, “remember!” once more

the lamplight on his son’s sleeping face.

Opening the letter, I read as follows:--

Low Tor Cottage, by Liskeard, Cornwall,

Sept. 3, 188--.

Dear F.:--Remember promise given long ago. Pray come as soon as possible!

Thine

CLARENCE WYGRAM.

In the circumstances, what could I do but make arrangements, as

speedily as I could, to keep my promise? Within twenty-four hours I was

on my way to Cornwall.

CHAPTER II.

A GIG awaited my arrival at the nearest railway station, and a short

drive brought me to Low Tor Cottage. Dr. Wygram met me at the door.

Considering the lapse of years since our last interview, I was, of

course, prepared to find my friend looking much older; but I was

scarcely prepared to see him so utterly feeble-looking and broken,

alike, apparently, with age and sorrow, as when he greeted me in

the doorway. He bade me welcome in hurried nervous tones; evidently

he laboured under the influence of suppressed emotion. We entered

the sitting-room: the dinner-table was set for two persons only. He

apologized for his secluded quarters, and the humble arrangements

of his household. “I have only been here for a month or two,” he

explained, “since my return from the Continent.” A staid, elderly

maid-servant here entered the room. It was, of course, too early for

any confidential talk between my host and myself; and, as the servant

waited upon us during dinner, anything but commonplaces were out of the

question. I judged from what I saw, however, that Dr. Wygram was living

alone; perhaps it was better so. Our intercourse would be the more

unrestrained.

Somehow, I do not know how it happened, I was the first to break the

ice, upon the question of the object of my visit. And this prematurely,

in fact within half an hour of my arrival. Now I had mentally cautioned

myself, on the way down, against precipitate allusions to the purpose

of my coming; yet, as it chanced, I stumbled upon the delicate topic,

unawares, before the servant had left us to our wine. It was, then,

on his son’s account that Dr. Wygram sought my presence here. As

much I gathered from his silence, sudden and pained, when I made the

remark. Of course after this, and until we were alone together, I

turned the conversation into other channels, in what I fear must have

seemed a very clumsy fashion. My host grew more and more absent and

distrait. When at length we drew our chairs near the fire, for the

autumn evenings were growing chilly, he had not opened his lips for

some minutes. I was quite unprepared for what was to come. No sooner

were we alone, than, in his attempt to speak, he burst into tears.

It was long before he regained his composure. At first all he could

utter was a renewal of his thanks to me for coming to see him in his

loneliness--his worse than lonely life, as he termed it.

I could make nothing of all this, but I endeavoured to assure him of

my earnest desire to help him, if only he would frankly confide in me

as his friend. It was pitiful to see how, even after this invitation,

it pained him to make any avowal. He sank into a reverie for a few

moments, then, quickly rising to his feet and laying a hand on my

shoulder, said:--

“I will show you my sorrow, my friend, rather than speak of it myself.

What I show you will speak for itself, for all words are vain.”

So saying, he motioned me to follow him, and led the way from the room,

carrying with him a small shaded lamp.

When we entered an adjoining apartment the shadows there were so dense,

and the light we had with us was so feeble, that, for some moments, I

could discern nothing. A dull fire smouldered in the grate, but shed no

light on the interior of the room, which seemed furnished as a small

parlour. There was a large sofa at the farther end, and someone lay

upon it covered with rugs. Dr. Wygram held the light a little lower,

the rays fell upon an upturned face, that of a boy apparently asleep.

I started, for was it not the self-same face upon which the flickering

light of a railway carriage lamp had fallen so many years before? The

very same, in every lineament, nothing was changed.

I am not naturally quick in coming to a conclusion. Things dawn upon

me now even more slowly than of old. I was startled for the moment,

nothing more; though a creeping horror moved already towards my heart,

I had not felt its actual touch.

“That is my sorrow,” said the father, turning to me, without diverting

the rays of the lamp from his son’s face; then, without another word,

motioned me to follow him out. I did so. The shadows fell once more

upon the sleeper, even as the shadows of the years had fallen, till

that moment, upon my recollection of his features.

On a sudden the full significance of what I had seen rushed upon me.

“Great God!” I cried, “what is this, Wygram? Speak!”

We were in the corridor now, and he did not return an answer. We

re-entered the lighted room. My patience gave way.

“For Heaven’s sake,” I said, “Wygram, tell me what is the meaning of

this! How is your son--the boy sleeping yonder--the same, unchanged--?”

The query died upon my lips, for he to whom I spoke was pale as ashes.

I read the answer of my inarticulate question, there and then, in his

face. By virtue of some nightmare spell, the boy I had seen so many

years before, the boy, who by this time should have been a grown man,

was slumbering, _still a boy_, in the room we had just quitted.

They say that when, in dreams, anything manifestly absurd or

inconsistent presents itself, the dreamer at once awakes. In the

sitting-room of the cottage that night, seated beside my old friend,

how often did I think myself dreaming, and long for the moment of

waking to be precipitated by the seeming contradiction I had just

witnessed! For some time neither of us spoke. Dr. Wygram sat motionless

with the blank and, as it were, featureless expression on his

countenance which I have so often seen sudden calamity impart. Yet

his affliction, new and inexplicable to me as yet, must have become

familiar enough to himself. After all, it must have been its first,

its only revelation to another, which, as it were, reawakened himself

to a sense of its utter bewilderment and hopelessness. And to me (of

all men) he had turned for help, for counsel, in circumstances so

astounding! What could I do? My own brain was in a whirl. The sense

of wonderment once past, a painful search for possible explanation

succeeded--explanation of what? That was the puzzling difficulty. A

problem was before me, but, from lack of all precedent, the conditions

of effectual presentation were wanting. How, then, attempt the solution?

It must have arisen, I suppose, from the mental confusion under which

I laboured that I can give no very lucid account of what immediately

followed. I cannot tell at what period of the evening the silent

current of our several thoughts flowed into a stream of conversation.

But I reproduce here the substance of Dr. Wygram’s narrative, in his

own words, as far as possible, omitting some details not germane to the

narrative.

“My son,” commenced Dr. Wygram, “inherited his mother’s malady, that

which in her case proved fatal, pulmonary consumption. The unmistakable

symptoms developed themselves in him at an early age. All the so-called

remedies had been tried without avail. Humanly speaking, my boy was

doomed, my house was apparently to be left unto me desolate. At first

I was in despair, a despair lightened to me at last, however, by a

gleam of hope. You are aware that I have devoted my life to the study

rather than the practice of medicine. Being untrammelled with regular

avocations, I have been enabled to explore, more fully than many of my

professional brethren, what may be called the by-paths of study--those

less explored tracks which are open to the medical scientist who is,

by training, a chemist as well. The practice of scientific medicine,

among us in this country, at all events, is in its infancy, although

many, whose interest it is to conceal the fact, will assure you to

the contrary. If any proof were needed of my assertion, the lame

and halting methods in use at the present day would suffice. The

insufferable greed for money so shamelessly manifested renders the

modern practitioner only a better-class charlatan. Their failures are

so gross, their expedients to conceal these failures so unblushing,

that I have long recommended an adoption by the public of the Chinese

system. The far-seeing Celestials only pay their medical adviser when

they are perfectly well. When they fall sick his pay stops till he can

restore them to health.

“But there is a second, and a higher path, known only to a few, and

these enthusiasts, careless of the rewards of the crowd. It is but a

dim and perilous way at the best--it is easier to deride those who

attempt to traverse it than to follow them. The herd of the profession

eschew it for the most part. Present-day materialists will have

nothing, accept nothing, which cannot be seen, tasted, handled, brayed

in a mortar, fitting fate for themselves as purblind fools! See how

reluctantly, how incredulously, the results of even such a coarsely

unmistakable remedy as electricity are received by the profession.

Yet electrical energy, in medicine, is a clumsy weapon compared

with others in the armoury of transcendentalism. There are blades

infinitely keener for the expert--viewless brands, wielded by few--the

peerless Excalibur itself, known to still fewer--for its point of a

truth turneth every way, to guard the path to the Tree of Life.” Here

he shuddered, but after a pause went on: “These higher methods have

their risks, their inseparable dangers. Remember that experiment must

at last be made upon the living, human, subject. Demonstration upon

a score of tortured puppies will not avail. Is _it_ a wonder that

the crude experimentalist, great at the torture trough, and brave in

_its_ cruelties, recoils when the higher issue is at stake? But as

I said, my boy was doomed, save, as I hoped, in the last resort of

transcendentalism. That last resort I tried, but not until numberless

trials in the laboratory had convinced me that my method must avail. I

had discounted every possibility of failure. So long did I delay that

the lamp of life had almost, with him, burned to the socket. But I was

wary; I knew well that the step I was about to take was an irrevocable

one, and my chief anxiety was to prevent a possible miscarriage of

consequences. My plan, in short, promised to secure for one, already

within sight of death’s portal, a lease of life prolonged--by how many

months or years I could not tell--that question lay in darkness, but

at least prolonged beyond what I could reasonably expect considering

his condition. A growth of new vital force--which yet was not a

growth--everything pointed the other way, let me say a stock, was

to be grafted into the decaying and wasting organism, permanent in

its character, constant, without flux or reflux. But (ah! that but

which mars all that blooms and hopes!), like all gifts added from

without, unlike all properties resident within, it, the gift, had an

imperfection, a strange, deadly, and irremediable fault. It grew not,

progressed not, aged not (do not start!); and this, its thrice-accursed

property, was so malignantly, so devilishly potent, beyond hope of

elimination or reduction, that it subdued unto itself whatsoever

it touched or joined. Life preserved under its influence would be

preserved, not in activity but as it were in arrestment, in default of

needed repair, or rather with a subtle supply and repair of its own so

elusive as to evade detection.

“Thus,” continued Dr. Wygram--”thus, with all my caution, I

erred--erred as all do, misled by some devil’s wile, who work against

the gods. Fool that I was, my own caution deceived me, and that lying

legend of him who sought for immortality, but forgot the advent of old

age. But it is past now; others would have slipped on that insuperable

threshold where I fell. I exulted in the thought that my boy would

drink of the water of life and so defy the killing years--but I forgot

that _he was not yet a man_--knew not that I was condemning him to a

life of immaturity. Hurry misled me at the last. Before I knew it, he

was almost gone--then I took the irrevocable step. It was well that I

worked in secret. No eye but mine saw him as (oh, wondrous change!)

he rose from his sick-bed with an assured gift of life in every limb

and pulse, so sudden and startling that I dreaded the coming of life’s

angel almost as much as I had the advent of him of death. For a time,

I say, I would almost, unknowing, have undone that which had been

done--but that stage passed, and I only watched and waited.”

Dr. Wygram paused. Was it fancy that as he did so I thought I heard a

light footstep in the room above us? The speaker did not seem to notice

it, but went on:--

“For a time I knew no fear, that I had erred I did not know, as yet.

For months he advanced in growth towards manhood. Then the spell began

to work its hellish will. As he was then, as he is now, so will he

ever be. A blight fell upon him, a chill mildew rained itself upon the

issues of his life. A true death in life is his, for life hasteth to

fruition and then falls; but this existence, with which I have dowered

him, continues changeless, dateless, ageless, as the years of the

Everlasting. I tell thee,” screamed the father, as he sprang to his

feet in a frenzy of uncontrollable horror--”I tell thee my boy will

never die!”

Overmastered by the contagion of his excitement, I too had risen from

my seat. As we faced each other in silence, a breathing murmur rose on

the air, formless at first, then died away. Again a hushed murmur, then

a crash of chords from an instrument in the room above. He of whom we

spoke was playing Chopin’s “Marche Funèbre.”

CHAPTER III.

I NEED not enter into the details of my stay at Low Tor Cottage, even

if I were able to reproduce them with correctness. My residence there

was, to me, a prolonged nightmare, with all hope of an awakening denied

me. Dr. Wygram had so completely surrendered himself to despair as

to be incapable of making any effort. It would have been a positive

relief to myself had I been able to have considered him insane, and

the mystery before me a delusion springing from that cause. But that

conclusion was shut out most effectually by my own personal testimony

(of which he always eagerly availed himself) as to his son’s identity,

and his practically unaltered condition after an interval of so many

years. I had every opportunity of assuring myself on this point. Young

Wygram, though shy and backward, preferring to mope in solitude, was

our companion after a day or two. But he never seemed wholly at ease,

would not join in any sustained conversation, and had an apathetic

listlessness about him which was positively repellent. It was vain to

try to arouse either father or son from the overwhelming depression

into which both had apparently sunk. Some melancholy drives we took

together in a pony phaeton through the solitudes of West Cornwall did

not enliven us much. It is a haunted land at its best, with its rolling

moorlands, and its mystic Dosmery Pool, fabled as ebbing and flowing

in its silent depths in sympathy with the tides of the distant sea.

As day after day slipped away, I began to feel myself as partaking

of my friend’s hopelessness. Yet, if I hinted the uselessness of

continuing with him, he would become almost frantic. As he pathetically

repeated to me, I was his only friend, the only one to whom he could

confide his sorrows, so insupportable when borne alone. Gradually he

persuaded me, on one point, against my better judgment. It was finally

agreed between us that ere I left some steps should be taken on his

part to endeavour to obtain a reversal, or part reversal rather, of

the conditions under which his son laboured (I use the periphrasis

as the plain words to me are unspeakably painful), by something of

the same methods by which they had been compassed. The prospect to me

was very distasteful, indeed revolting, nor did Dr. Wygram’s laboured

explanations convey much information to my non-professional mind. It

is useless to detail them here, they would be intelligible only to the

expert. But I could not deny him what he asked. I fancy his wish was

to secure some witness of his own moral innocency, should any untoward

accident happen. I cannot blame him; indeed, I think he would have been

justified in taking almost any steps, short of taking his son’s life,

in the unparalleled circumstances of the case.

And the time was short. That was another perplexity. The constant

state of nervous apprehension which overcame Dr. Wygram whenever his

residence in one place lasted any time, pointed, of itself, to the

necessity of making haste. Perhaps he magnified this difficulty; I

cannot say. But there was something about their retired life which

seemed likely to invite gossiping curiosity, in a country district

more especially. That the neighbours had already questioned him as

to the nature of his son’s _delicacy_ he assured me over and over

again. What could they mean? “He has been watched,” the father would

say, excitedly. “We have already been here too long. They notice his

unaltered appearance since our arrival. A growing lad, such as he

appears, would have made some progress in the time, and they notice

that he does not--nor ever will,” he would add bitterly, “unless my

last efforts should prove successful.” It was idle to try to reason

him out of these fears--for all I knew they might be real. It was

pitiful to think how long they had possessed him, during many weary

years. When I had met himself and his son fifteen years before, they

were, even then, travelling as fugitives from place to place to avoid

detection; still more harrowing to think that, in the father’s case,

from his rapidly aging look and growing feebleness, these wanderings

must soon cease. Of his son’s fate, in that overwhelming contingency, I

could never trust myself to think. The thought of it often overcame Dr.

Wygram himself. He told me once, that on one occasion, when abroad, the

terror of this self-same prospect so unmanned him that he had attempted

to confide in a brother practitioner, an Englishman, resident, I

think, in Milan. “Like most countrymen of his craft abroad,” said my

poor friend bitterly, “he proved to be utterly incredulous. I might

have known it, before exposing myself to his coarse ridicule. The line

of my studies has been so utterly outside the old groove of pill and

bolus, lancet and catheter, it is little wonder that the crowd will

have none of its results. This professional brother only laughed in

my face, rubbed his hands in glee, as at a good joke, asking me if I

would not part with my recipe for a consideration, seeing he had some

half-dozen youngsters of his own whose growing powers added to the

tailor’s bill. English medical men are proverbially obtuse, but for the

full development of their sheer obstinacy and mulishness they should be

transplanted to the soil which gave birth to transcendentalism.”

It was a breathless autumn evening when, in my presence, Dr. Wygram

commenced his second experiment with his son. The dim scent of the

shrubberies stole in through the open windows--over which the blinds

were drawn. On a couch in the centre of the room lay young Wygram

in a deep slumber, super-induced by an opiate which his father had

administered, to aid the further stages of the treatment. A brass

chafing dish lay upon the floor, containing some smouldering embers;

from a tripod upon the table hung a small retort of crimson glass which

glowed like a ruddy gem in the flickering light of the spirit lamp

underneath.

With arms stripped bare to the elbows, Dr. Wygram bent over his son,

watching the depth of unconsciousness in which the latter was immersed.

For nearly an hour my friend had not spoken a word. I did not wish to

interrupt him, but I saw by his manner at length that the critical

moment had arrived. He turned to me at last, and in a broken whisper

told me that a few moments longer would decide his success or failure.

“We shall now, I trust,” he said, “have insight granted us in regard to

a hitherto hidden mystery.”

I do not know whether he ever obtained the insight in question, but

I know that it was never granted to me. For, at that moment, loud

voices were heard in the corridor. The door was unceremoniously thrown

open, and three men entered the room. Their leader, a puffy, red-faced

individual, fixed me with his glittering eye from the moment of his

coming into the room. “That is the man!” he said, to his subordinates,

pointing, at the same time, to me as I stood irresolute.

A sudden panic possessed me that instant. To escape by the door was

impossible, as the men stood beside it, but the window behind me was

handy. I turned, lifted the blind, and precipitately jumped into the

garden a few feet below. I do not believe that I ever ran so fast in my

life as I did on that occasion through the mazes of the shrubbery. My

one frantic desire was to get away at all hazards from that dreadful

dwelling, though from what I fled I could not have told. I only knew

that horror, the accumulated horror, of the past weeks, compressed into

the moment, possessed me to my very heels. A wretched dog prowling

about the garden gave chase to me as I fled, under the impression

that I was making off with some portable property belonging to the

establishment; but I soon left him far behind, and I do not think that

the men joined in the pursuit, beyond the limits of the cottage, if,

indeed, they followed me at all. In my terror I never looked behind,

but ran through fields, hedges, and ditches till I arrived, breathless

and hatless, at the nearest railway station. The officials seemed

somewhat surprised at the appearance I presented, but I got a ticket

without question, and was soon seated in a railway carriage on my way

to London.

* * * * *

These memoranda, written after a long period of nervous prostration,

must be published, if for my own exculpation alone. Shortly after their

committal to paper, a longing curiosity impelled me to inquire as to

the fate of my old friend. I had promised not to desert him, and that

promise I had scarcely kept. At all hazards, then, I resolved to go to

Cornwall once more, even if by doing so, I should fall into the hands

of the authorities, as I doubted not he had done. At all events, my own

innocency was beyond question.

On the Paddington platform my apprehensions in this latter respect were

redoubled. A young man standing beside me, when I was taking out my

ticket, certainly eyed me very narrowly.

“One of the minions of the law,” I said to myself; “the affair has got

wind after all.” As I was about to take my seat he came forward and

asked if he had the pleasure of addressing Mr. F---- of Blank Street.

Resolved to brazen it out to the last, I admitted my identity.

“You are acquainted with Dr. Wygram, I think?” he continued,

interrogatively.

I owned that I was. Denial, at this stage, would have been useless.

“I am his son,” he said smilingly.

“His son!” I gasped. Then, after all, Dr. Wygram’s second experiment

had succeeded, and he who was before me had been freed from the spell

of his youth. Yes, there was no doubt of it! He was now a man! “Is it

possible?” I repeated, gazing at him with astonishment.

“I think there is no doubt of it,” he replied coolly. “You will be

sorry to learn that my father is far from well,” he resumed. “I have

been from home for a long time, but am just going down to see him, in

Cornwall.”

“Just going down to see him?” This was mystery upon mystery.

“My dear sir,” I said in despair, “I am very sorry indeed to hear of

your father’s illness, but would you kindly answer me one question as

distinctly as you can. If you are Dr. Wygram’s son, how is it that you

do not remember me?”

“I do now most distinctly,” he replied. “I remember travelling with you

and my father, many years ago, when I was going to school in the North.”

Heavens! Then all the years, since then, had been a blank to him!

“Have you no recollection,” I suggested, “of having been with your

father since then, a short time ago, in Cornwall?”

“Ah! that is my brother,” he quickly returned. “Yes, _he_ was with my

father, when he took ill--been with him too long, in fact, for the good

of either. My father, I am sorry to say, has for some time been quite

unhinged mentally.”

I should think he has, was my inward comment, for I saw it all in a

moment. There were two young Wygrams; both of these I had seen when

they were youngsters of the same age. Why had I not thought of this

before? Is it not my special weakness that things dawn upon me very

slowly? The rest, of course, was Dr. Wygram’s delusion, ultimately

necessitating his being placed under the care of his friends.

“My dear sir,” I replied, after a pause, and with some effusion of

manner, “I sincerely trust that your father’s distressing illness may

be but temporary. On his being able to receive the message, kindly

present him with my warmest regards. Meanwhile, one question more

before we part, for I am not going by this train; I--I have changed my

mind. How many years, may I ask, may there be between your own age and

that of your brother?”

“About fourteen or fifteen,” was the reply.

“Quite so; and when you were youngsters of about the same age, say,

were you not considered very like one another?”

“Remarkably so,” he answered, laughingly, “as like as two peas.”

G. M. MCCRIE.

XIII

ON THE INDIA FRONTIER: THE DOCTOR’S STORY.

“WANT Berlyng,” he seemed to be saying, though it was difficult to

catch the words, for we were almost within range, and the fight was a

sharp one. It was the old story of India frontier warfare; too small a

force and a foe foolishly underrated.

The man they had just brought in--laying him hurriedly on a bed of

pine-needles, in the shade of the conifers where I had halted my little

train--poor Charles Noon of the Sikhs, was done for. His right hand was

off at the wrist, and the shoulder was almost severed.

I bent my ear to his lips, and heard the words which sounded like “Want

Berlyng.”

We had a man called Berlyng in the force--a gunner--who was round at

the other side of the fort that was to be taken before night, two miles

away at least.

“Do you want Berlyng?” I asked slowly and distinctly. Noon nodded, and

his lips moved. I bent my head again till my ear almost touched his

lips.

“How long have I?” he was asking.

“Not long, I’m afraid, old chap.”

His lips closed with a queer, distressed look. He was sorry to die.

“How long?” he asked again.

“About an hour.”

But I knew it was less. I attended to others, thinking all the while

of poor Noon. His home life was little known, but there was some story

about an engagement at Poonah the previous warm weather. Noon was rich,

and he cared for the girl; but she did not return the feeling. In

fact, there was some one else. It appears that the girl’s people were

ambitious and poor, and that Noon had promised large settlements. At

all events, the engagement was a known affair, and gossips whispered

that Noon knew about the some one else and would not give her up. He

was, I know, thought badly of by some, especially by the elders.

However, the end of it all lay on a sheet beneath the pines and watched

me with such persistence that I was at last forced to go to him.

“Have you sent for Berlyng?” he asked, with a breathlessness which I

know too well.

Now, I had not sent for Berlyng, and it requires more nerve than I

possess to tell unnecessary lies to a dying man. The necessary ones are

quite different, and I shall not think of them when I go to my account.

“Berlyng could not come if I sent for him,” I replied soothingly. “He

is two miles away from here, trenching the North Wall, and I have

nobody to send. The messenger would have to run the gauntlet of the

enemy’s earthworks.”

“I’ll give the man a hundred pounds who does it,” replied Noon, in his

breathless whisper. “Berlyng will come sharp enough. He hates me too

much.”

He broke off with a laugh which made me feel sick.

I found a wounded water-carrier--a fellow with a stray bullet in his

hand--who volunteered to find Berlyng, and then I returned to Noon and

told him what I had done. I knew that Berlyng could not come.

He nodded and I think he said, “God bless you.”

“I want to put something right,” he said, after an effort; “I’ve been a

blackguard.”

I waited a little, in case Noon wished to repose some confidence in

me. Things are so seldom put right that it is wise to facilitate such

intentions. But it appeared obvious that what Noon had to say could

only be said to Berlyng. They had, it subsequently transpired, not been

on speaking terms for some months.

I was turning away when Noon suddenly cried out in his natural voice,

“There _is_ Berlyng.”

I turned and saw one of my men, Swerney, carrying in a gunner. It might

be Berlyng, for the uniform was that of a captain, but I could not see

his face. Noon, however, seemed to recognize him.

I showed Swerney where to lay his man, close to me, alongside Noon, who

at that moment required all my attention, for he had fainted.

In a moment Noon recovered, despite the heat, which was tremendous.

He lay quite still, looking up at the patches of blue sky between the

dark, motionless tops of the pine trees.

His face was livid under the sunburn, and as I wiped the perspiration

from his forehead he closed his eyes with the abandon of a child.

Some men, I have found, die like children going to sleep. He slowly

recovered and I gave him a few drops of brandy. I thought he was dying

and decided to let Berlyng wait.

I did not even glance at him as he lay, covered with dust and blackened

by the smoke of his beloved nine-pounders, a little to the left of Noon

and behind me as I knelt at the latter’s side. After a while his eyes

grew brighter and he began to look about him.

He turned his head, painfully, for the muscles of his neck were

injured, and caught sight of the gunner’s uniform. “Is that Berlyng?”

he asked, excitedly. “Yes.”

He dragged himself up and tried to get nearer to Berlyng. And I helped

him. They were close alongside each other. Berlyng was lying on his

back, staring up at the blue patches between the pine-trees.

Noon turned on his left elbow and began whispering into the

smoke-grimed ear.

“Berlyng,” I heard him say, “I was a blackguard. I am sorry, old man. I

played it very low down. It was a dirty trick. It was my money--and her

people were anxious for her to marry a rich man. I worked it through

her people. I wanted her so badly that I forgot I--was supposed--to

be a--gentleman. I found out--that it was you--she cared for. But I

couldn’t make up my mind to give her up. I kept her--to her word. And

now it’s all up with me--but you’ll pull through and it will all--come

right. Give her my--love--old chap. You can now--because I’m done. I’m

glad they brought you in--because I’ve been able--to tell you--that it

is you she cares for. You--Berlyng, old chap, who used to be a chum

of mine. She cares for you--God, you’re in luck! I don’t know whether

she’s told you--and I was--a d----d blackguard.”

His jaw suddenly dropped--and he rolled forward with his face against

Berlyng’s shoulder.

Berlyng was dead when they brought him in. He had heard nothing. Or

perhaps he had heard and understood--everything.

HENRY SETON MERRIMAN.

XIV

DOCTOR GREENFIELD.

DR. GREENFIELD looked round his small study with satisfaction and a

touch of pride. In spite of the book-cases filled with treatises on

medicines and diseases, and the inevitable patient’s chair, the room

still managed to be an attractive one. The book-cases were of oak; the

dreaded chair lay claim to be a particularly good specimen of an early

Sheraton; and over the chimney-piece, and on all available space of the

soft green-colored walls hung good mezzotint prints in dark frames.

The servant put a match to the log-laid fire, for although it was May,

there was an evening chill, and a sensation of damp.

The Doctor had dined early, with the expectation of a long drive, so

his evening at home was unintentional, and caused by the little piece

of pink paper which now lay unheeded at his feet. He stretched himself,

felt how tired he was, and how luxurious was this unexpected evening at

home. Then he remembered the cause and, with an involuntary movement,

stooped and picked up the paper from where it lay. He opened it and

read it again, though he had done so several times already.

A telegram so short, but he knew what it had meant to the sender of

it; a lifelong message of despair, of shipwrecked hopes and utter

loneliness. “Charlie died this evening.” Dr. Greenfield read it out

loud quite slowly--and once more it fluttered to the ground, and he

sighed. So it was all over; the eight weeks’ watching; the alternate

hope and despair; the grim fight with death--and death had triumphed.

He saw the girl, the sender of the message, standing as she had done

when he told her that her brother must die. He thought of the weeks

during which time he had been so much thrown with this girl--Juliet

Carson--the days which they had spent together watching by the sick

man’s bed, fighting the battle of skill and science with destiny.

And all the time his mind dwelt on it, he knew it did not really touch

him--the worst part to him was that his science had failed him. For a

moment he let himself believe that the constant facing death, which as

a doctor he was bound to confront, had hardened his feelings, made him

callous, and taken his sense of pity and sympathy from him; but he was

too honest, and he remembered with a true flash of conviction that it

had always been so, and memory took him back over many years, and he

seemed to hear his nurse saying, “Master George has no heart, he didn’t

feel his father’s death a bit.” And it came to him how right she had

been, how he had wanted to care, but something wouldn’t let him; he

could not cry as his brother did, and he had felt as if he belonged

somewhere else. All his later life, too, he had known it. He had no

sympathy, no pity, and he knew that others felt the want in him, though

often they did not know what it was. He had lived for thirty-five

years now, and he had never cared for anyone; and for the first time

to-night, as he sat and looked into the fire, he knew that his life had

been only half complete, that he lacked what was the best, and that

his whole existence had been colourless. Still, as he argued against

himself, if he had lacked the best, he had also missed the worst: many

of his friends had gone; he had wanted to care, but the power was not

there; he had seen piteous sights; he had witnessed heartrending scenes

of poverty and despair, but they had all been nothing to him; they had

passed by, and he had forgotten.

Somehow the image of Juliet to-night came back to him; the girl in her

sorrow and loneliness with no one left to her; and he wondered why his

heart was not wrung with pity. Although she did not stir his heart, or

his senses, he could see she was beautiful; but for some other man, not

for him. A new and painful sensation of loneliness suddenly swept over

him, a horrible whiff of middle age, a foretaste of the solitude of old

age, which must overtake him, but he could do nothing to help himself,

he had no will, no power. He sat on in his deep reverie, with his eyes

fixed on the burning logs. Then he got up from his chair and went to

the window and looked out on the May evening.

It was half-past eight o’clock, and the chill which comes just after

sunset was in the air. He stood looking into the clear blue distance,

listening to the nightingales and the hum of the bees. Then suddenly

he saw a sight which astonished him--a procession winding its way down

the long avenue of limes which faced his window: a curious procession,

too--a funeral--it was unlike any he had seen before. It gave him a

strange sensation. Preceding it were men and women, chanting as they

went.

They paused as they came near to him, the singing ceased, and several

made a gesture as if they would ask him to join them; then they drew

back as he heard one say, “Ah, not him; he knows no pity, he has no

love, he cannot come;” and they passed on, taking up their chant; and

for the first time in his life he knew he was an outcast and a pariah.

He was hungering and thirsting for someone to help him and pity him.

Behind them came men carrying the body of the dead man, and he bowed

as they went by. Once more he looked, and he saw three figures--three

white-robed women, walking together. And the one who walked in the

midst had the eyes of Juliet Carson, and in her hands she held a large

cup. The three paused as they came near to him, and it seemed to him

as if a veil fell between the rest of the procession and them, the

music got fainter, and he was left alone with these three; something

within him told him that they held in that cup the power of pity and

love, that they alone could give them to him, and he cried to them

to take pity on him. Then Juliet, for it was Juliet, spoke to him;

her eyes were troubled, though her face shone with a radiant smile,

and her voice came to him as a soft wind, and stilled his despair and

restlessness.

“Listen,” she said, “and know what you ask. We are three sisters, Love,

Joy, and Sorrow, and if you drink of this cup you can never again be

as you were. You would wish, likely, to take only Love and Joy, but as

love brings joy, so also it surely brings sorrow, and you cannot take

one without the other. Say, will you take Love, and in so doing accept

Joy and Sorrow as they come?” and she paused while he made his choice.

But with eager, trembling hands he took the cup she offered him and

drank thirstily, and then--his whole being was flooded with hope and

delight, and as he handed the cup back to Juliet in her radiant form of

love, she bent forward a little and kissed him--a kiss which thrilled

his soul, and sent the life-blood rushing through his veins. Then the

figures vanished. Once more he heard the faint sound of distant music,

and then--and then * * *

The Doctor straightened himself in his chair, and looked round him in a

dazed, bewildered manner.

“A dream,” he murmured. “Is it possible? I, too, of all men.”

He looked round him. The May morning was breaking into his room, the

birds were singing, the sun was up. So then he had fallen asleep in

his chair, and all that seemed so real, so tangible, was nothing but a

dream--a dream of possibilities, and an awakening to realities.

As his mind grew clearer, he remembered all that had taken place the

night before--ah! that telegram was the reality; and once more he

stooped to pick it up. But, as he read it, a new feeling, and yet not

a new feeling came to him--the sensation of his dream. It made him

giddy, and he went to the window to steady himself, and to feel the

air. But in him, and all around him, he was conscious of a change; a

rush of almost divine pity and love swept across him. Ah! that, then,

was no dream; he was in touch with the love, the sorrow, and pity of

the world; he shared them all; he was one of them, he was no longer the

pariah, the outcast; and more than that, he too loved, and his love had

been alone with her suffering and sorrow all night. Last night he had

not cared; to-day the pity of it almost stifled him.

He threw up the window and stepped onto the lawn; the fresh dew was

upon everything, and he stretched himself in the rays of the sun, and

thanked God that he was alive. He looked long up the avenue, where in

his dream he had seen the procession come down, and he shuddered when

he thought how they had left him--no, not all--and his heart beat as he

thought of Juliet Carson, and how she had come to him at the time of

his great want. And the thought of her brought back to him the reality

and the present, and, as he listened to the clock striking six, he knew

that his restlessness must wait; he who had waited all his life was now

impatient for two hours to be over. Ah! had it come to this. He smiled

at his own impetuosity, but had not the heart to rebuke himself.

He spent the next two hours wandering up and down his garden, listening

to the morning sounds, as the world woke bit by bit to its day’s work.

He watched the workmen pass by his gate on their way to take up their

daily toil, and he wondered why he had never pitied them--his had

been so much more a case of pity. Though worn and tired, and perhaps

saddened, they, too, had loved; they had somewhere, sometime, romance

in their lives.

As the church clock struck eight he made his way to the stables and

ordered his dog-cart. His own voice had a conscious sound in it, and he

felt all the world must know he was a changed man. As he drove through

the deep lanes, with the honeysuckle, pink may, and wild cherry

blossom all in their beauty before him, he felt that there was only

life, only beauty in the world, and all the sorrowful and sad side of

it had fled away. But as he neared the old manor house, where death

triumphed, his beating heart quietened somewhat, and he felt a touch of

sorrow come over him.

He was evidently expected, for he was admitted at once into the long

low room, into which the sun was pouring. The window was thrown up, and

as he paused he felt that the stillness of death was in the house. Then

he heard a slight movement and turned. At the open window stood Juliet,

the sun’s rays lighting up her white gown, and her brown hair; her eyes

had the troubled expression of his dream, but there was no radiance in

the sad, weary, little face. In her hands she held great branches of

white lilacs, lilies, and roses.

He went to meet her with outstretched hand, and a great pity in his

heart spiritualizing his human love.

“I knew,” she said simply; “I knew you would come.” Had she, too, seen

the vision, or was it in his face?

And did she bend her head as in his dream?--for his lips found hers,

and that kiss drew the bitterness from her sorrow, while it opened up

his new life for him, sweeping away all the years he had left behind,

and flooding his soul with light and love.

And although they were in the presence of death, did not love triumph?

LADY MABEL HOWARD.

XV

DR. GLADMAN, A SKETCH OF COLONIAL LIFE.

IT WAS Christmas morning in Southern latitudes. The thermometer stood

at 80 degrees in the shade, and we had just finished a really splendid

run across the Pacific, right away from the Cape, without touching, and

we were all delighted to be once more about to stand on terra firma. I

had signed articles in London, at a shilling a month, as surgeon, to

the good ship “Teneriffe,” the Company naturally considering the said

shilling good pay in addition to a free passage for myself, and at a

reduced rate for my wife, to Sidney.

We were passing a lighthouse, and could see the smoke rising from the

little settlement at King George’s Sound. The houses and harbour itself

were hidden by the first of the many headlands that were between us and

the narrow opening to the anchorage. There was the usual bustle on deck

and tramping to and fro of the sailors, who were getting the anchor

clear and the decks in readiness to let go.

My wife and her sister were making certain changes in their dress that

they might be ready the moment we dropped anchor to go ashore. I could

hear my wife ask her sister Rosie if she could really believe “this

everlasting voyage was over?” as I was hurriedly finishing off my

letters in the saloon to take ashore. I had just fastened and sealed

up a long letter to my friend H. at “Bart’s,” and another to my mother

in peaceful Devonshire, and had done the same for some half dozen or

more of my wife’s, when I heard the orders, “Hard a-port,” “Ease her,”

“Slow,” passed to the wheel and engine room as the pilot’s boat came

alongside. It was manned by four rowers in man-o’-war’s-man dress, and

a tiny golden-haired boy, who didn’t look more than ten, in the stern

holding the tiller ropes in his little brown fist, and keeping his eyes

fixed on the pilot’s movements till he was safe on deck. Then he said

authoritatively, “Let go the rope; fall astern,” rolling the “r” and

giving it “starn” in the approved style.

I ran down the companion-way again, and knocked at our state-room

to tell my women-folk to come up and see him--they both are so fond

of children. On going in I found my wife standing in the midst of

open portmanteaus, fastening on her sister’s white veil or puggery,

attired herself in shore-going garments, and with another long

red-and-white-striped puggery shading her own neck. My wife insists on

considering Australia tropical!

“Do they wear gloves, do you suppose, in this place?” she said, taking

a long pair of grey ones off the cabin sofa, with a somewhat scornful

emphasis on the “this place” which expressed her private feeling about

Australia generally.

“Of course they do; life in Australian towns is the same as life

anywhere else,” I said, proud of my information, derived from the

blue-books of the Agent-General.

My wife smiled. She has a peculiarly sweet way of smiling sometimes,

instead of answering one, which is equivalent to her to having the last

word, and is far more than equivalent to me, and very trying, as I have

to conjecture what the last word would have been.

We all went on deck. The pilot’s boat was already some distance

astern, and we could hardly see the little boy. We found we were

steaming slowly through the blue water, past the swelling furze-covered

headlands, the one we had just passed being crowned by a white

lighthouse, with what looked at the distance a tiny white cottage, with

neat palings and outhouses round it.

The pilot was in command on the bridge. We could see his figure against

the sky, standing on the narrow strip of a platform, from which the

officer of the watch rules his seagirt kingdom with an even more

absolute despotism than that of the sultans of the “Arabian Nights.”

His broad back, upright figure, and strong hands grasping the rail in

front, gave one a sense of security, though the quick clear enunciation

of the necessary orders was not quite that of a sailor, or at least did

not sound so, after the jolly roar to which we were accustomed in our

skipper.

For all that, we soon found ourselves safely anchored well in sight of

the tiny jetty of the straggling collection of wooden and corrugated

iron buildings that form the town of Albany.

The ship was at once surrounded by a swarm of copper-coloured

savages--lads and men, from apparently ten years old to about

thirty--more or less nude, who proceeded, one out of each pair in

their rough boats, to dive into the clear blue water after the coins

the passengers threw in, and which they came up holding in their white

teeth, shaking the water out of their close black curls.

We were watching two of these chattering gleaming “bronzes,” as my wife

called them, averring that unless you looked upon them as statuary they

were really not proper, when the captain came up to us, as we leant

over the bulwarks, to introduce the pilot, who stood just behind him

with an amused smile at my wife’s last remark.

“Doctor, let me introduce Dr. Gladman, our pilot, to you,” said our

skipper. “Mrs. M. and Miss N., this is our parish doctor, health

officer, and pilot--Dr. Gladman.”

The pilot bowed, and holding his peaked cap in his left hand stood

with his close curling grey hair uncovered in the glowing Australian

sunshine, while he shook hands with my wife and her sister. “Welcome to

Australia, ladies,” said he, still holding his cap.

“Thank you, doctor,” said my wife. “But are you not afraid to remain

uncovered in this dreadful sun?”

“Not for a short moment, madam,” he replied, and added, glancing at

her delicate pale face and the more blooming cheeks of her sister,

“We naturalised Australians long ago gave up all hope of having your

beautiful English complexions,” replaced his cap.

“Naturalised?” echoed Rosie, looking ready to shake hands over again.

“Are you really an Englishman, Dr. Gladman? Oh! I am so glad. I was

afraid every one would be Australian--Colonial now.”

Dr. Gladman laughed. “A good colonist,” he said, “but not a Colonial.

No, it certainly seems a very long time ago, but I did originally come

from ‘Home,’ as we say out here. I was born in Buckinghamshire, and

bred at Bart’s.”

The magic word Bart’s--my beloved hospital!--completed the charm Dr.

Gladman’s fine head, clever face, and quick cheery speech had worked.

Here was a brother in arms, at the first push off! As we made the tour

of the ship together, necessary before he could give us our clean

bill of health and a soul could leave the ship, I found he had known

several of the older men of my time who were youngsters in his. He had

qualified fifteen years before I did, but by the time we had reached

the cabin to go over the ship’s papers with the captain he seemed an

old friend. There is something in the air of strange lands that draws

Englishmen together. I had been sent out for my health; so had he, he

told me with a jolly laugh, “quite a wreck, they said, ten years ago!”

I told him the latest medical news from England, and found he was only

a fortnight behind me! and saw his _Medical Journal_ and _Lancet_ as

regularly as I did. As we sat down to the saloon table, I asked him how

they managed for a pilot, supposing a ship should come in and signal

for one, while he was away across the bay, or over on the bush, in his

capacity of doctor.

“Oh,” said Dr. Gladman, “it doesn’t often happen. You see the regular

liners--the P. and O. and Orient boats--don’t require a pilot, they

come in so often. I don’t quite know why you signalled for one,

skipper,” he added, turning to the captain, who had ordered sherry

to be put on the table, and was sitting with his elbows well squared

putting his very black and inky signature to the ship’s papers.

“I’ve never been in here as skipper before. Why, it must be four years

since I was here at all, Gladman. I was chief officer on the ‘Regulus,’

don’t you remember, when I last came into the Sound? Let’s see, in 1880

it was.”

“Ay, so you were,” returned the pilot; “but,” he added, turning to me,

“one of my boat’s crew has a pilot’s license too, and can take a boat

in quite as well as I can. If they don’t care to have him, they have

to wait till I get back, if I am out. Once or twice I’ve been run very

hard though, doing pilot and doctor at the same time almost.”

“I remember, Gladman, just this very day, eight years ago,” struck in

the captain, “you took in the ‘Badger’ for Captain D----. I was his

mate then, just before that awful gale of wind when the old jetty was

nearly washed to pieces. It was the first time I ever saw you, and you

were off then to some good lady--do you remember?”