Coombe is a pretty place. It has broad streets, quiet and tree-lined. It
has sunny, empty lots where children play. No one is crowded or shut in.
The houses stand in their own green lawns, and are comfortable and even
picturesque. The Swiss chalet style has not yet come to Coombe, so the
architecture, though plain, is not productive of nightmare. The roads
are like country roads, soft and yellowish; green grass grows along the
sides of many of them, and board sidewalks are still to be found,
springy and easy to the tread. There is a main street with macadamised
roadway and stone pavements, real flat stone, for they were laid before
the appearance of the all-conquering cement. There is a postoffice with
a tower and a clock, a courthouse with a fountain and a cannon, a park
with a bandstand and a baseball diamond, a townhall with a belfry and no
bell, an exhaustive array of churches, the Imperial Hotel, and the
market. We mention the market last (as we were taught at school) because
on account of its importance it ought to come first.
When Dr. Callandar, having been efficiently valeted by Bubble, set out
to pay his first professional call, he drew in deep breaths of the
pleasant air with a feeling of well-being to which he had long been a
stranger. He had slept. In spite of the room, in spite of the chocolate
cake, in spite of the pie, he had slept. And that alone was enough to
make the whole world over. It was still hot but with a heat different
from the heat of yesterday. A little shower had fallen during the night.
There was a sense of the north in the air, a light freshness, very
invigorating. He liked the quiet shaded streets; the cannon by the
courthouse amused him; the number of church steeples left him amazed. He
felt as if he had stumbled into a dream-town and must walk carefully
lest he stumble out.
Bubble had given him very complete directions, indeed so minute were
they that we will omit them lest some day you find the way yourself and
drop in on Mrs. Sykes when she is not expecting company. But Dr.
Callandar in his amused absorption had forgotten that he was going to
Mrs. Sykes at all, when he was recalled to a sense of duty by a sharp
hail from the corner house of a street he had just passed. Looking back,
he saw, half-way down the road, a tall, red woman leaning over a gate,
who, upon attracting his attention, began waving her arms frantically,
after the manner of an old-fashioned signalman inviting a train to "Come
on." Callandar's step quickened in spite of himself and he forgot his
idle musings.
"Land sakes! I thought you'd never get here!" exclaimed the red woman
fervently. "I suppose that imp of a boy didn't direct you right. Lucky I
knew you as soon as you passed the corner. Mark Morrison may be as
useless as they make 'em, but he's got a fine gift for description. Come
right in. I'm dreadful anxious about Ann. It don't seem like measles,
and she's had chicken-pox twice, and if she's sickening for anything
worse I want to know it. I ain't one of them optimists that won't
believe they're sick till they're dead. Callandar's your name, Mark
says--any chance of your being a cousin to Dr. Callandar of Montreal
that cured Mrs. Sowerby?"
"No, I am not that Dr. Callandar's cousin."
"I told Mark 'twasn't likely--or you wouldn't be here. Not if he'd any
family feeling. I'm a great believer in a man making his own
stepping-stones anyway," she went on with a friendly smile; "we ought to
rise up on ourselves, like the poet says, and not on our cousins."
"A noble sentiment," said Callandar gravely, as he followed her up the
walk, across a veranda so clean that one hesitated to step on it, and
into a small hall, bare and spotless, where he was invited to hang
up his hat.
"You're younger than I expected," went on Mrs. Sykes kindly. "I hope you
ain't entirely dependent on your practice in Coombe?"
The amazed doctor was understood to murmur something about "private
means."
"That's good. You'd starve if you hadn't. Coombe's a terrible healthy
place and poor Doc. Simmonds didn't pay a call a week. I just felt like
some one ought to warn you. I despise folks who hold back from telling
things because they ain't quite pleasant. Know the worst, I always say;
it's better in the end. Of course, as Mark says, your being a
Presbyterian will make considerable diff'rence. Some folks thought Doc.
Simmonds was pretty nigh an infiddle!"
Too overcome by his feelings to answer, Callandar followed her up the
narrow stair and into a clean bright room with green-tinted walls and
yellow matting on the floor.
Mrs. Sykes waved a deprecatory hand, at once exhibiting and apologising
for so much splendour.
"This is the spare-room," she explained. "And there," pointing to the
high, old-fashioned bed, "is Ann."
Callandar crossed the immaculate matting gingerly, taking Ann on faith,
as it were, for, from the door, no; Ann was visible, only a very small
dent in the big whiteness of the bed.
"Ann! Here's the doctor!"
A small black head and a pair of frightened black eyes appeared for a
moment as if by conjuration, and instantly vanished.
"Ann!" said Mrs. Sykes more sternly.
There was a squirming somewhere under the bedclothes, but nothing
happened.
"Great Scott!" exclaimed the doctor, "you've got the child in a
feather-bed!"
Mrs. Sykes beamed complacently.
"Yes, I have. It may seem like taking a lot of trouble for nothing, but
you never can tell. I ain't one of them that never prepares for
anything. Jest as soon as Ann gets sick I move her right into the
spare-room and put her into the best feathers. Then if she should be
took sudden I wouldn't have anything to regret. The minister and the
doctor can come in here any hour and find things as I could wish....
Ann! what do you mean by wiggling down like that? Ann--come up at once!
The doctor wants to see your tongue."
This time the note of command was effective. The black head came to the
surface, again followed by the frightened eyes and plump little cheeks
stained with feverish red.
"Some cool water, if you please," ordered the doctor in his best
professional manner. Mrs. Sykes opened her lips to ask why, but
something caused her to shut them without asking.
When she had left the room, Callandar leaned suddenly over and lifted
Ann bodily out of the dent and placed her firmly upon a pillow. It was a
very plump pillow, evidently filled with the "best feathers," but
compared with the bed it was as a rock in an ocean.
"Now," he said gravely, "you are safe, for the present. You are on an
island; but be very careful not to slide off for if you do I may never
be able to look at your tongue."
The child's hands grasped the island convulsively.
"Don't hold on like that," he warned. "You might tip." He leaned close
so that she might see the smile in his eyes, "And if you tipped ..."
The child gave a sudden delighted giggle. "I'd go right in over my head,
wouldn't I?"
"Yes. And next time you were rescued you might feel more inclined to
tell your aunt what you had been eating before you became ill."
Ann stopped giggling.
"You don't need to tell _me_," went on the doctor, "because I know!"
"How d'ye know?"
"Magic. Be careful--you were nearly off that time! Does your aunt know
anything about those things you ate?"
"No."
"Very well. But you must promise not to eat those particular things
again. Not even when you get the chance." Then as he saw the woe upon
her face, "At least, not in quantities!"
"Cross my heart!" said Ann, relieved.
"Here's the water," said Mrs. Sykes, returning. "Ann, get right back
into bed. Do you want to get your death? Haven't I told you till I'm
tired to keep your hands in? Is it measles, Doctor? She's subject to
measles. Perhaps it's the beginning of scarlet fever. But if it's
smallpox I want to know. No good ever comes of smoothing things over."
The doctor smiled at Ann.
"It isn't smallpox this time, Mrs. Sykes."
"Did you look at them spots on the back of her neck?"
"Yes. A little rash caused by indigestion. I wouldn't worry."
"Don't mind me. I'm used to worrying. I don't dodge my troubles like
some I know. Indigestion? It looks more like eczema. Eczema is a
terrible trying thing. But if the child's got it I don't want it called
indigestion to spare my feelings."
"But it's not eczema! It's indigestion--and prickly heat. I'm afraid
Ann's stomach has been giving trouble. It has been hotter than is usual
here, I understand. Heat often upsets children. While I write out a
prescription, you might bathe her face and hands."
Mrs. Sykes gazed doubtfully at the water. "She was done once last night
and once this morning just before you came in," she remarked in an
injured tone. "But if you think she needs it again, this sort of water's
no good. Nothing's ever any good for Ann except hot water and soap."
The doctor looked up from his writing in surprise. Then as the meaning
of the thing dawned upon him, he laughed heartily.
"Oh, Ann's as clean as the veranda floor!" he explained. "This is just
to cool her off. Let me show you--doesn't that feel nice, Ann?"
"Lovely!" blissfully.
Mrs. Sykes sniffed.
"I suppose that's some new-fangled notion? I never heard before of
cooling people off when they've got a fever. In my time, the hotter you
were, the hotter you were made to be, till you got cool naturally. I
suppose," with half-interested sarcasm, "that you'd give her cold water
to drink if she asked for it?"
"Certainly."
"Well, I expect she knows better than to ask for it!"
Feeling Ann's imploring gaze, Callandar resorted to diplomacy.
"The fact is, Mrs. Sykes," he said pleasantly, "there really isn't very
much wrong with Ann. You have been letting your forethought and your
natural anxiety run away with you. There is not the slightest occasion
for alarm. If there were, I should not dream of hiding it from one so
well-prepared as yourself. As it is, you have taken a lot of needless
trouble--this beautiful feather-bed, for example! I feel sure that Ann
would do very well in her own bed."
The victim of the feathers gave a relieved gasp which her aunt mistook
for a sigh of regret.
"Her own bed's well enough for anything ordinary," she admitted in a
mollified tone. "Even if it is a store mattress."
"Quite good enough. Many a little girl would be glad of it." The
doctor's tone was virtuous. "If you will allow me, I shall carry her in
now. You see, she is cooler already. By to-morrow, if she takes her
medicine, she ought to be as well as ever."
Ann's own room turned out to be on the shady side, and though not so
grand as the spare-room, it was pleasantly cool. The little bed with the
hard mattress and the snowy counterpane was infinitely to be preferred
to the ocean of feathers, and the rescued maiden lay back on her smaller
pillows with a sigh of gratitude.
"Sure you won't tell?" she whispered as he laid her down.
"Honour bright. Cross my heart! But you must take the medicine. It's
nasty, but not too nasty, and you mustn't squeal--or it will be the
spare-room again. Red cheeks and prickly heat are consequences, but
feather-beds and medicine are retribution."
"That's right, Doctor," said Mrs. Sykes, who had heard the last words.
"There's nothing like a word about retribution when a person's sick. It
helps 'em to realise their state. I don't hold with the light-minded
that want to get away from retribution. Depend upon it, they're the very
folks that's got it coming to them. Yes. No one needs to go around
denying that there's a hell, if their feet are planted upon a rock and
they know they're never going there. It's years now since I've looked
hell in the face and turned my feet the other way. But I do say that if
I'd decided to go straight ahead in the broad and easy path, I wouldn't
try to shut my eyes to the end of it, like some folks! Are you putting
up at the Imperial, Doctor?"
"'Putting up' exactly expresses my condition."
"Well, you may as well know at once that a doctor in a hotel will never
get any forwarder in Coombe. You'll have to get boarding somewhere. Have
you looked around yet?"
"No. I--"
"Then I don't mind telling you that the spare-room is to let and the
little room down below that has a door of its own and seems made exactly
for a doctor's office. I shouldn't mind letting you have them if you
feel sure that the smells wouldn't get loose all through the house and
in the cooking. There's a barn where you could keep your horse."
"I haven't got a horse," protested Callandar feebly.
"But of course you'll be getting one. A doctor has to have a horse. If
you can't pay for it down, Mark knows some one who'd let you have a good
one on time. You can trust Mark, if he _is_ mournful. Of course I don't
say that these rooms are the only rooms to let in Coombe, but I do think
they're about as good as you can get--being so near to Dr. Coombe's old
house. People get used to coming for a doctor down this street."
"But that was, over a year ago."
"It takes more 'an a year for Coombe folks to change their ways. Only
this day week I saw Bill Brooks tearing down this way on account of Mrs.
Brooks' being took kind of unexpected, and Bill losing his head and
forgetting all about Dr. Coombe being dead and Dr. Parker living on the
other side of the town."
"And you think that if I'd been here he would have 'tore' in here?"
"If he hadn't I'd just have called out to him as he went by. He was that
wild he'd have taken anybody."
"I see," with humility. "I lost a good chance there!"
"Well, if you live here you'll get others. Why, from the spare-room
windows you can see the corner window down at the Coombe place. I could
make out to let you have your meals, too. Only I'd expect you to be as
reg'lar as Providence permitted. I know a doctor is bound to be more
aggravating in that way than other folks, but if you'd be as regular as
lay in you, I'd put up with it. 'Tisn't as if I wasn't always prepared.
When will you want to move in?"
"Really, I--I don't know--" The bewildered Callandar glanced for help to
Ann, but met only clasped hands and an imploring stare. "I'll--I'll let
you know," he faltered.
Thinking it over afterwards, he could never understand why he did not
promptly refuse to be coerced, but at the time surrender seemed the only
natural thing. Besides, he couldn't stay another day at the Imperial. He
had to go somewhere. Perhaps it was his destiny to secure Ann against
further feather-beds. Anyway, he accepted it.
"Oh, goody!" cried Ann, clapping her hands.
"Ann! put your hands under those clothes. How often must I tell you that
you'll get your death? If you like, Doctor, there's nothing to prevent
your moving in to-morrow. I'll need a day to air the feather-tick and
make some pie."
The doctor was at last roused to action.
"There are conditions," he said hastily. "If I come here, there is to be
no feather-tick and no pie!"
"No feather-bed?" in amazement.
"No pie?" Ann's voice was a sorrowful whisper.
"You see," Callandar explained, "I am here partly for my health. My
health cannot lie on feather-beds nor eat pie--well, perhaps," with a
glance at Ann, "an occasional pie may do no harm. But I shall send down
some springs and a mattress. I have to use a special kind," hastily.
"Oh! it's spinal trouble, is it?" Mrs. Sykes surveyed him
commiseratingly. "You look straight enough. But land! You never can
tell. Them spinal troubles are most deceiving. Terrible things they are,
but they don't shorten life as quickly as some others. Not that that's a
blessing! Mostly, folks as has them would be glad to go long before they
are took. Still, it gives them some time to be prepared. I remember--"
"I must go now, Mrs. Sykes. Give Ann some of the medicine as soon as it
comes. It isn't exactly spinal trouble that is the matter with me, you
know, but--er--I'll send down the kind of mattress I like. In fact, I
shall probably wish to furnish my rooms myself. You won't mind,
I'm sure."
"Land sakes, no, I don't mind! Most doctors are finicky. Don't worry
about the medicine. I'll see that Ann takes it."
She watched him go with a glance in which satisfaction and foreboding
mingled. "Poor young feller!" she mused. "He didn't like what I said
about his spine a mite. Back troubles makes folks terrible touchy."