MY NEW PATIENT.
In the feverish restlessness of the London night, with its rumbling
market-wagons and the constant tinkling of cab-bells, so different to
the calm, moonlit stillness of the previous night in rural England, I
wrote a long explanatory letter to my love.
I admitted that I had wronged her by my apparent coldness and
indifference, but sought to excuse myself on the ground of the
pressure of work upon me. She knew well that I was not a rich man, and
in that slavery to which I was now tied I had an object--the object I
had placed before her in the dawning days of our affection--namely,
the snug country practice with an old-fashioned comfortable house in
one of the quiet villages or smaller towns in the Midlands. In those
days she had been just as enthusiastic about it as I had been. She
hated town life, I knew; and even if the wife of a country doctor is
allowed few diversions, she can always form a select little
tea-and-tennis circle of friends.
The fashion nowadays is for girls of middle-class to regard the
prospect of becoming a country doctor's wife with considerable
hesitation--"too slow," they term it; and declare that to live in the
country and drive in a governess-cart is synonymous with being buried.
Many girls marry just as servants change their places--in order "to
better themselves;" and alas! that parents encourage this latter-day
craze for artificiality and glitter of town life that so often
fascinates and spoils a bride ere the honeymoon is over. The majority
of girls to-day are not content to marry the hard-working professional
man whose lot is cast in the country, but prefer to marry a man in
town, so that they may take part in the pleasures of theatres, variety
and otherwise, suppers at restaurants, and the thousand and one
attractions provided for the reveller in London. They have obtained
their knowledge of "life" from the society papers, and they see no
reason why they should not taste of those pleasures enjoyed by their
wealthier sisters, whose goings and comings are so carefully
chronicled. The majority of girls have a desire to shine beyond their
own sphere; and the attempt, alas! is accountable for very many of the
unhappy marriages. This may sound prosy, I know, but the reader will
forgive when he reflects upon the cases in point which arise to his
memory--cases of personal friends, perhaps even of relations, to whom
marriage was a failure owing to this uncontrollable desire on the part
of the woman to assume a position to which neither birth nor wealth
entitled her.
To the general rule, however, my love was an exception. Times without
number had she declared her anxiety to settle in the country; for,
being country born and bred, she was an excellent horsewoman, and in
every essential a thorough English girl of the Grass Country, fond of
a run with either fox or otter hounds; therefore, in suburban life at
Kew, she had been entirely out of her element.
In that letter I wrote, composing it slowly and carefully--for like
most medical men I am a bad hand at literary composition--I sought her
forgiveness, and asked for an immediate interview. The wisdom of being
so precipitous never occurred to me. I only know that in those night
hours over my pipe I resolved to forget once and for all that letter I
had discovered among the "dead" man's effects, and determined that,
while I sought reconciliation with Ethelwynn, I would keep an open and
watchful eye upon Mary and her fellow conspirator.
The suggestion that Ethelwynn, believing herself forsaken, had
accepted the declarations of a man she considered more worthy than
myself, lashed me to a frenzy of madness. He should never have her,
whoever he might be. She had been mine, and should remain so, come
what might. I added a postscript, asking her to wire me permission to
travel down to Hereford to see her; then, sealing up the letter, I
went out along the Marylebone Road and posted it in the pillar-box,
which I knew was cleared at five o'clock in the morning.
It was then about three o'clock, calm, but rather overcast. The
Marylebone Road had at last become hushed in silence. Wagons and cabs
had both ceased, and save for a solitary policeman here and there the
long thoroughfare, so full of traffic by day, was utterly deserted. I
retraced my steps slowly towards the corner of Harley Street, and was
about to open the door of the house wherein I had "diggings" when I
heard a light, hurried footstep behind me, and turning, confronted the
figure of a slim woman of middle height wearing a golf cape, the hood
of which had been thrown over her head in lieu of a hat.
"Excuse me, sir," she cried, in a breathless voice, "but are you
Doctor Boyd?"
I replied that such was my name.
"Oh, I'm in such distress," she said, in the tone of one whose heart
is full of anguish. "My poor father!"
"Is your father ill?" I inquired, turning from the door and looking
full at her. I was standing on the step, and she was on the pavement,
having evidently approached from the opposite direction. She stood
with her back to the street lamp, so I could discern nothing of her
features. Only her voice told me that she was young.
"Oh, he's very ill," she replied anxiously. "He was taken queer at
eleven o'clock, but he wouldn't hear of me coming to you. He's one of
those men who don't like doctors."
"Ah!" I remarked; "there are many of his sort about. But they are
compelled to seek our aid now and then. Well, what can I do for you? I
suppose you want me to see him--eh?"
"Yes, sir, if you'd be so kind. I know its awfully late; but, as
you've been out, perhaps you wouldn't mind running round to our house.
It's quite close, and I'll take you there." She spoke with the
peculiar drawl and dropped her "h's" in the manner of the true
London-bred girl.
"I'll come if you'll wait a minute," I said, and then, leaving her
outside, I entered the house and obtained my thermometer and
stethoscope.
When I rejoined her and closed the door I made some inquiries about
the sufferer's symptoms, but the description she gave me was so
utterly vague and contradictory that I could make nothing out of it.
Her muddled idea of his illness I put down to her fear and anxiety for
his welfare.
She had no mother, she told me; and her father had, of late, given way
just a little to drink. He "used" the Haycock, in Edgware Road; and
she feared that he had fallen among a hard-drinking set. He was a
pianoforte-maker, and had been employed at Brinsmead's for eighteen
years. Since her mother died, six years ago, however, he had never
been the same.
"It was then that he took to drink?" I hazarded.
"Yes," she responded. "He was devoted to her. They never had a wry
word."
"What has he been complaining of? Pains in the head--or what?"
"Oh, he's seemed thoroughly out of sorts," she answered after some
slight hesitation, which struck me as peculiar. She was greatly
agitated regarding his illness, yet she could not describe one single
symptom clearly. The only direct statement she made was that her
father had certainly not been drinking on the previous night, for he
had remained indoors ever since he came home from the works, as
usual, at seven o'clock.
As she led me along the Marylebone Road, in the same direction as
that I had just traversed--which somewhat astonished me--I glanced
surreptitiously at her, just at the moment when we were approaching
a street lamp, and saw to my surprise that she was a sad-faced girl
whose features were familiar. I recognised her in a moment as the girl
who had been my fellow passenger from Brighton on that Sunday night.
Her hair, however, was dishevelled, as though she had turned out from
her bed in too great alarm to think of tidying it. I was rather
surprised, but did not claim acquaintance with her. She led me
past Madame Tussaud's, around Baker Street Station, and then into
the maze of those small cross-streets that lie between Upper Baker
Street and Lisson Grove until she stopped before a small, rather
respectable-looking house, half-way along a short side-street,
entering with a latch-key.
In the narrow hall it was quite dark, but she struck a match and lit
a cheap paraffin lamp which stood there in readiness, then led me
upstairs to a small sitting-room on the first floor, a dingy, stuffy
little place of a character which showed me that she and her father
lived in lodgings. Having set the lamp on the table, and saying that
she would go and acquaint the invalid with my arrival, she went out,
closing the door quietly after her. The room was evidently the home of
a studious, if poor, man, for in a small deal bookcase I noticed,
well-kept and well-arranged, a number of standard works on science
and theology, as well as various volumes which told me mutely that
their owner was a student, while upon the table lay a couple of
critical reviews, the "Saturday" and "Spectator."
I took up the latter and glanced it over in order to pass the time,
for my conductress seemed to be in consultation with her father. My
eye caught an article that interested me, and I read it through,
forgetting for a moment all about my call there. Fully ten minutes
elapsed, when of a sudden I heard the voice of a man speaking somewhat
indistinctly in a room above that in which I was sitting. He seemed to
be talking low and gruffly, so that I was unable to distinguish what
was said. At last, however, the girl returned, and, asking me to
follow her, conducted me to a bedroom on the next floor.
The only illumination was a single night-light burning in a saucer,
casting a faint, uncertain glimmer over everything, and shaded with an
open book so that the occupant of the bed lay in deepest shadow.
Unlike what one would have expected to find in such a house, an iron
bedstead with brass rail, the bed was a great old-fashioned one with
heavy wool damask hangings; and advancing towards it, while the girl
retired and closed the door after her, I bent down to see the invalid.
In the shadow I could just distinguish on the pillow a dark-bearded
face whose appearance was certainly not prepossessing.
"You are not well?" I said, inquiringly, as our eyes met in the dim
half-light. "Your daughter is distressed about you."
"Yes, I'm a bit queer," he growled. "But she needn't have bothered
you."
"Let me remove the shade from the light, so that I can see your face,"
I suggested. "It's too dark to see anything."
"No," he snapped; "I can't bear the light. You can see quite enough of
me here."
"Very well," I said, reluctantly, and taking his wrist in one hand I
held my watch in the other.
"I fancy you'll find me a bit feverish," he said in a curious tone,
almost as though he were joking, and by his manner I at once put him
down as one of those eccentric persons who are sceptical of any
achievements of medical science.
I was holding his wrist and bending towards the light, in order to
distinguish the hands of my watch, when a strange thing happened.
There was a deafening explosion close behind me, which caused me to
jump back startled. I dropped the man's hand and turned quickly in the
direction of the sound; but, as I did so, a second shot from a
revolver held by an unknown person was discharged full in my face.
The truth was instantly plain. I had been entrapped for my watch and
jewellery--like many another medical man in London has been before me;
doctors being always an easy prey for thieves. The ruffian shamming
illness sprang from his bed fully dressed, and at the same moment two
other blackguards, who had been hidden in the room, flung themselves
upon me ere I could realize my deadly peril.
The whole thing had been carefully planned, and it was apparent that
the gang were quite fearless of neighbours overhearing the shots. The
place bore a bad reputation, I knew; but I had never suspected that a
man might be fired at from behind in that cowardly way.
So sudden and startling were the circumstances that I stood for a
moment motionless, unable to fully comprehend their intention. There
was but one explanation. These men intended to kill me!
Without a second's hesitation they rushed upon me, and I realized with
heart-sinking that to attempt to resist would be utterly futile. I was
entirely helpless in their hands!