DR. WEST'S SANCTUM.
For some little time past, certain rumours had arisen in Deerham
somewhat to the prejudice of Dr. West. Rumours of the same nature had
circulated once or twice before during the progress of the last half
dozen years; but they had died away again, or had been hushed up, never
coming to anything. For one thing, their reputed scene had not lain at
the immediate spot, but at Heartburg; and distance is a great
discouragement to ill-natured tattle. This fresh scandal, however, was
nearer. It touched the very heart of Deerham, and people made themselves
remarkably busy over it--none the less busy because the accusations were
vague. Tales never lose anything in carrying, and the most outrageous
things were whispered of Dr. West.
A year or two previous to this, a widow lady named Baynton, with her two
daughters, no longer very young, had come to live at a pretty cottage in
Deerham. Nothing was known of who they were, or where they came from.
They appeared to be very reserved, and made no acquaintance whatever.
Under these circumstances, of course, their history was supplied for
them. If you or I went and established ourselves in a fresh place
to-morrow, saying nothing of who we were, or what we were, it would only
be the signal for some busybody in that place to coin a story for us,
and all the rest of the busybodies would immediately circulate it. It
was said of Mrs. Baynton that she had been left in reduced
circumstances; had fallen from some high pedestal of wealth, through the
death of her husband; that she lived in a perpetual state of
mortification in consequence of her present poverty, and would not admit
a single inhabitant of Deerham within her doors to witness it. There may
have been as little truth in it as in the greatest _canard_ that ever
flew; but Deerham promulgated it, Deerham believed in it, and the
Bayntons never contradicted it. The best of all reasons for this may
have been that they never heard of it. They lived quietly on alone,
interfering with nobody, and going out rarely. In appearance and manners
they were gentlewomen, and rather haughty gentlewomen, too; but they
kept no servant. How their work was done, Deerham could not conceive: it
was next to impossible to fancy one of those ladies scrubbing a floor or
making a bed. The butcher called for orders, and took in the meat, which
was nearly always mutton-chops; the baker left his bread at the door,
and the laundress was admitted inside the passage once a week.
The only other person admitted inside was Dr. West. He had been called
in, on their first arrival, to the invalid daughter--a delicate-looking
lady, who, when she did walk out, leaned on her sister's arm. Dr.
West's visits became frequent; they had continued frequent up to within
a short period of the present time. Once or twice a week he called in
professionally; he would also occasionally drop in for an hour in the
evening. Some people passing Chalk Cottage (that was what it was named)
had contrived to stretch their necks over the high privet hedge which
hid the lower part of the dwelling from the road, and were immensely
gratified by the fact of seeing Dr. West in the parlour, seated at tea
with the family. How the doctor was questioned, especially in the
earlier period of their residence, he alone could tell. Who were they?
Were they well connected, or ill connected, or not connected at all?
Were they known to fashion? How much was really their income? What was
the matter with the one whom he attended, the sickly daughter, and what
was her name? The questions would have gone on until now, but that the
doctor stopped them. He had not made impertinent inquiries himself, he
said, and had nothing at all to tell. The younger lady's complaint arose
from disordered liver; he had no objection to tell them that; she had
been so long a sufferer from it that the malady had become chronic; and
her name was Kitty.
Now, it was touching this very family that the scandal had arisen. _How_
it arose was the puzzle; since the ladies themselves never spoke to
anybody, and Dr. West would not be likely to invent or to spread stories
affecting himself. Its precise nature was buried in uncertainty, also
its precise object. Some said one thing, some another. The scandal, on
the whole, tended to the point that Dr. West had misbehaved himself. In
what way? What had he done? Had he personally ill-treated them--sworn at
them--done anything else unbecoming a gentleman? And which had been the
sufferer? The old lady in her widow's cap? or the sickly daughter? or
the other one? Could he have carelessly supplied wrong medicine; sent to
them some arsenic instead of Epsom Salts, and so thrown them into
fright, and danger, and anger? Had he scaled the privet hedge in the
night, and robbed the garden of its cabbages? What, in short, was it
that he had done? Deerham spoke out pretty broadly, as to the main
facts, although the rumoured details were varied and obscure. It
declared that some of Dr. West's doings at Chalk Cottage had not been
orthodox, and that discovery had followed.
There are two classes of professional men upon whom not a taint should
rest; who ought, in familiar phrase, to keep their hands clean--the
parson of the parish, and the family doctor. Other people may dye
themselves in Warren's jet if they like; but let as much as a spot get
on him who stands in the pulpit to preach to us, or on him who is
admitted to familiar intercourse with our wives and children, and the
spot grows into a dark thundercloud. What's the old saying? "One man may
walk in at the gate, while another must not look over the hedge." It
runs something after that fashion. Had Dr. West not been a family
doctor, the scandal might have been allowed to die out: as it was,
Deerham kept up the ball, and rolled it. The chief motive for this, the
one that influenced Deerham above all others, was unsatisfied curiosity.
Could Deerham have gratified this to the full, it would have been
content to subside into quietness.
Whether it was true, or whether it was false, there was no denying that
it had happened at an unfortunate moment for Dr. West. A man always in
debt--and what he did with his money Deerham could not make out, for his
practice was a lucrative one--he had latterly become actually
embarrassed. Deerham was good-natured enough to say that a handsome sum
had found its way to Chalk Cottage, in the shape of silence-money, or
something of the sort; but Deerham did not know. Dr. West was at his
wits' end where to turn to for a shilling--had been so, for some weeks
past; so that he had no particular need of anything worse coming down
upon him. Perhaps what gave a greater colour to the scandal than
anything else was the fact that, simultaneously with its rise, Dr.
West's visits to Chalk Cottage had suddenly ceased.
Only one had been bold enough to speak upon the subject personally to
Dr. West, and that was the proud old baronet, Sir Rufus Hautley. He rode
down to the doctor's house one day; and, leaving his horse with his
groom, had a private interview with the doctor. That Dr. West must have
contrived to satisfy him in some way, was undoubted. Rigidly severe and
honourable, Sir Rufus would no more have countenanced wrongdoing, than
he would have admitted Dr. West again to his house, whether as doctor or
anything else, had he been guilty of it. But when Sir Rufus went away,
Dr. West attended him to the door, and they parted cordially, Sir Rufus
saying something to the effect that he was glad his visit had dispelled
the doubt arising from these unpleasing rumours, and he would recommend
Dr. West to inquire into their source, with a view of bringing their
authors to punishment. Dr. West replied that he should make it his
business to do so. Dr. West, however, did nothing of the sort; or if he
did do it, it was in strict privacy.
Jan sat one day astride on the counter in his frequent abiding-place,
the surgery. Jan had got a brass vessel before him, and was mixing
certain powders in it, preparatory to some experiment in chemistry,
Master Cheese performing the part of looker-on, his elbows, as usual, on
the counter.
"I say, we had such a start here this morning," began young Cheese, as
if the recollection had suddenly occurred to him. "It was while you had
gone your round."
"What start was that?"
"Some fellow came here, and--I say, Jan," broke off young Cheese, "did
you ever know that room had got a second entrance to it?"
He pointed to the door of the back room--a room which was used
exclusively by Dr. West. He had been known to see patients there on rare
occasions, but neither Jan nor young Cheese was ever admitted into it.
It opened with a latch-key only.
"There is another door leading into it from the garden," replied Jan.
"It's never opened. It has got all those lean-to boards piled against
it."
"Is it never opened, then?" retorted Master Cheese. "You just hear. A
fellow came poking his nose into the premises this morning, staring up
at the house, staring round about him, and at last he walks in here. A
queer-looking fellow he was, with a beard, and appeared as if he had
come a thousand miles or two, on foot. 'Is Dr. West at home?' he asked.
I told him the doctor was not at home; for, you see, Jan, it wasn't ten
minutes since the doctor had gone out. So he said he'd wait. And he went
peering about and handling the bottles; and once he took the scales up,
as if he'd like to test their weight. I kept my eye on him. I thought a
queer fellow like that might be going to walk off with some physic, like
Miss Amilly walks off the castor oil. Presently he comes to that door.
'Where does this lead to?' said he. 'A private room,' said I, 'and
please to keep your hands off it.' Not he. He lays hold of the false
knob, and shakes it, and turns it, and pushes the door, trying to open
it. It was fast. Old West had come out of there before going out, and
catch him ever leaving that door open! I say, Jan, one would think he
kept skeletons there."
"Is that all?" asked Jan, alluding to the story.
"Wait a bit. The fellow put his big fist upon the latch-key-hole--I
think he must have been a feller of trees, I do--and his knee to the
door, and he burst it open. Burst it open, Jan! you never saw such
strength."
"I could burst any door open that I had a mind to," was the response of
Jan.
"He burst it open," continued young Cheese, "and burst it against old
West. You should have seen 'em stare! They both stared. I stared. I
think the chap did not mean to do it; that he was only trying his
strength for pastime. But now, Jan, the odd part of the business is, how
did West get in? If there's not another door, he must have got down the
chimney."
Jan went on with his compounding, and made no response.
"And if there _is_ a door, he must have been mortal sly over it,"
resumed the young gentleman. "He must have gone right out from here, and
in at the side gate of the garden, and got in that way. I wonder what he
did it for?"
"It isn't any business of ours," said Jan.
"Then I think it is," retorted Master Cheese. "I'd like to know how many
times he has been in there, listening to us, when we thought him a mile
off. It's a shame!"
"It's nothing to me who listens," said Jan equably. "I don't say things
behind people's backs, that I'd not say before their faces."
"I do," acknowledged young Cheese. "Wasn't there a row! Didn't he and
the man go on at each other! They shut themselves up in that room, and
had it out."
"What did the man want?" asked Jan.
"I'd like to know. He and old West had it out together, I say, but they
didn't admit me to the conference. Goodness knows where he had come
from. West seemed to know him. Jan, I heard something about him and the
Chalk Cottage folks yesterday."
"You had better take yourself to a safe distance," advised Jan. "If this
goes off with a bang, your face will come in for the benefit."
"I say, though, it's you that must take care and not let it go off,"
returned Master Cheese, edging, nevertheless, a little away. "But about
that room? If old West----"
The words were interrupted. The door of the room in question was pushed
open, and Dr. West came out of it. Had Master Cheese witnessed the
arrival of an inhabitant from the other world, introduced by the most
privileged medium extant, he could not have experienced more intense
astonishment. He had truly believed, as he had just expressed it, that
Dr. West was at that moment a good mile away.
"Put your hat on, Cheese," said Dr. West.
Cheese put it on, going into a perspiration at the same time. He thought
nothing less than that he was about to be dismissed.
"Take this note up to Sir Rufus Hautley's."
It was a great relief; and Master Cheese received the note in his hand,
and went off whistling.
"Step in here, Mr. Jan," said the doctor.
Jan took one of his long legs over the counter, jumped off, and stepped
in--into the doctor's sanctum. Had Jan been given to speculation, he
might have wondered what was coming; but it was Jan's method to take
things cool and easy, as they came, and not to anticipate them.
"My health has been bad of late," began the doctor.
"Law!" cried Jan. "What has been the matter?"
"A general disarrangement of the system altogether, I fancy," returned
Dr. West. "I believe that the best thing to restore me will be change of
scene--travelling; and an opportunity to embrace it has presented
itself. I am solicited by an old friend of mine, in practice in London,
to take charge of a nobleman's son for some months--to go abroad with
him."
"Is he ill?" asked literal Jan, to whom it never occurred to ask whether
Dr. West had first of all applied to his old friend to seek after such a
post for him.
"His health is delicate, both mentally and bodily," replied Dr. West. "I
should like to undertake it: the chief difficulty is leaving you here
alone."
"I dare say I can do it all," said Jan. "My legs get over the ground
quick. I can take to your horse."
"If you find you cannot do it, you might engage an assistant," suggested
Dr. West.
"So I might," said Jan.
"I should see no difficulty at all in the matter if you were my partner.
It would be the same as leaving myself, and the patients could not
grumble. But it is not altogether the thing to leave only an assistant,
as you are, Mr. Jan."
"Make me your partner, if you like," said cool Jan. "_I_ don't mind.
What'll it cost?"
"Ah, Mr. Jan, it will cost more than you possess. At least, it ought."
"I have got five hundred pounds," said Jan. "I wanted Lionel to have it,
but he won't. Is that of any use?"
Dr. West coughed. "Well, under the circumstances----But it is very
little! I am sure you must know that it is. Perhaps, Mr. Jan, we can
come to some arrangement by which I take the larger share for the
present. Say that, for this year, you forward me----"
"Why, how long do you mean to be away?" interrupted Jan.
"I can't say. One year, two years, three years--it may be even more than
that. I expect this will be a long and a lucrative engagement. Suppose,
I say, that for the first year you transmit to me the one-half of the
net profits, and, beyond that, hand over to Deborah a certain sum, as
shall be agreed upon, towards housekeeping."
"I don't mind how it is," said easy Jan. "They'll stop here, then?"
"Of course they will. My dear Mr. Jan, everything, I hope, will go on
just as it goes on now, save that I shall be absent. You and
Cheese--whom I hope you'll keep in order--and the errand boy: it will
all be just as it has been. As to the assistant, that will be a future
consideration."
"I'd rather be without one, if I can do it," cried Jan; "and Cheese will
be coming on. Am I to live with 'em?"
"With Deb and Amilly? Why not? Poor, unprotected old things, what would
they do without you? And now, Mr. Jan, as that is settled so far, we
will sit down, and go further into details. I know I can depend upon
your not mentioning this abroad."
"If you don't want me to mention it, you can. But where's the harm?"
"It is always well to keep these little arrangements private," said the
doctor. "Matiss will draw up the deed, and I will take you round and
introduce you as my partner. But there need not be anything said
beforehand. Neither need there be anything said at all about my going
away, until I actually go. You will oblige me in this, Mr. Jan."
"It's all the same to me," said accommodating Jan. "Whose will be this
room, then?"
"Yours, to do as you please with, of course, so long as I am away."
"I'll have a turn-up bedstead put in it and sleep here, then," quoth
Jan. "When folks come in the night, and ring me up, I shall be handy.
It'll be better than disturbing the house, as is the case now."
The doctor appeared struck with the proposition.
"I think it would be a very good plan, indeed," he said. "I don't fancy
the room's damp."
"Not it," said Jan. "If it were damp, it wouldn't hurt me. I have no
time to be ill, I haven't. Damp--Who's that?"
It was a visitor to the surgery--a patient of Dr. West's--and, for the
time, the conference was broken up, not to be renewed until evening.
Dr. West and Jan were both fully occupied all the afternoon. When
business was over--as much so as a doctor's business ever can be
over--Jan knocked at the door of this room, where Dr. West again was.
It was opened about an inch, and the face of the doctor appeared in the
aperture, peering out to ascertain who might be disturbing him. The same
aperture which enabled him to see out, enabled Jan to see in.
"Why! what's up?" cried unceremonious Jan.
Jan might well ask it. The room contained a table, a desk or two, some
sets of drawers, and other receptacles for the custody of papers. All
these were turned out, desks and drawers alike stood open, and their
contents, a mass of papers, were scattered everywhere.
The doctor could not, in good manners, shut the door right in his
proposed new partner's face. He opened it an inch or two more. His own
face was purple: it wore a startled, perplexed look, and the drops of
moisture had gathered on his forehead. That he was not in the most easy
frame of mind was evident. Jan put one foot into the room: he could not
put two, unless he had stepped upon the papers.
"What's the matter?" asked Jan, perceiving the signs of perturbation on
the doctor's countenance.
"I have had a loss," said the doctor. "It's the most extraordinary
thing, but a--a paper, which was here this morning, I cannot find
anywhere. I _must_ find it!" he added, in ill-suppressed agitation. "I'd
rather lose everything I possess, than lose that."
"Where did you put it? When did you have it?" cried Jan, casting his
eyes around.
"I kept it in a certain drawer," replied Dr. West, too much disturbed to
be anything but straightforward. "I have not had it in my hand for--oh,
I cannot tell how long--months and months, until this morning. I wanted
to refer to it then, and got it out. I was looking it over when a rough,
ill-bred fellow burst the door open----"
"I heard of that," interrupted Jan. "Cheese told me."
"He burst the door open, and I put the paper back in its place before I
spoke to him," continued Dr. West. "Half an hour ago I went to take it
out again, and I found it had disappeared."
"The fellow must have walked it off," cried Jan, a conclusion not
unnatural.
"He could not," said Dr. West; "it is quite an impossibility. I went
back there"--pointing to a bureau of drawers behind him--"and put the
paper hastily in, and locked it in, returning the keys to my pocket. The
man had not stepped over the threshold of the door then; he was a little
taken to, I fancy, at his having burst the door, and he stood there
staring."
"Could he have got at it afterwards?" asked Jan.
"It is, I say, an impossibility. He never was within a yard or two of
the bureau; and, if he had been, the place was firmly locked. That man
it certainly was not. Nobody has been in the room since, save myself,
and you for a few minutes to-day when I called you in. And yet the paper
is gone!"
"Could anybody have come into the room by the other door?" asked Jan.
"No. It opens with a latch-key only, as this does, and the key was safe
in my pocket."
"Well, this beats everything," cried Jan. "It's like the codicil at
Verner's Pride."
"The very thing it put me in mind of," said Dr. West. "I'd rather--I'd
rather have lost that codicil, had it been mine, than lose this, Mr.
Jan."
Jan opened his eyes. Jan had a knack of opening his eyes when anything
surprised him--tolerably wide, too, "What paper was it, then?" he cried.
"It was a prescription, Mr. Jan."
"A prescription!" returned Jan, the answer not lessening his wonder.
"That's not much. Isn't it in the book?"
"No, it is not in the book," said Dr. West. "It was too valuable to be
in the book. You may look, Mr. Jan, but I mean what I say. This was a
private prescription of inestimable value--a secret prescription, I may
say. I would not have lost it for the whole world."
The doctor wiped the dew from his perplexed forehead, and strove, though
unsuccessfully, to control his agitated voice to calmness. Jan could
only stare. All this fuss about a prescription!
"Did it contain the secret for compounding Life's Elixir?" asked he.
"It contained what was more to me than that," said Dr. West. "But you
can't help me, Mr. Jan. I would rather be left to the search alone."
"I hope you'll find it yet," returned Jan, taking the hint and
retreating to the surgery. "You must have overlooked it amongst some of
these papers."
"I hope I shall," replied the doctor.
And he shut himself up to the search, and turned over the papers. But he
never found what he had lost, although he was still turning and turning
them at morning light.