Up The Hill And Over Part 19

"It looks like it, Janie. But you'll like it. Mrs. Bremner has a little girl."

"I don't like little girls."

"Then you ought to! The change will probably do you good."

Jane looked dubious. "Things that I don't want never do me any good.

Will you help me with my 'rithmetic?"

"I will when I come back."

"Where're you going?"

"Out. I'll not be long. Answer Aunt Amy's bell if it rings, like a dear child."

Esther's decision had been made, as many important decisions are, suddenly, and without conscious thought. All the puzzling over what was right and wrong seemed no longer necessary. Without knowing why, she knew that it had become imperative to get some good advice and get it at once. If she had been disturbed and uneasy before, she was frightened now. Something must be done, if not for Mary's sake at least for the sake of the honoured name she bore, and for Jane's sake!

"Mother doesn't seem to _know_ when a thing is wrong any more!" was the burden of the girl's thought as she hurried upstairs.

She knew where the prescription was kept--in a little drawer of her father's old desk, a drawer supposed to be secret. To-morrow Mary would take it away with her. Esther opened the drawer without allowing herself a moment for thought or regret. The paper was there, folded, in its usual place.

With a sigh of relief she seized it, hurried to her own room for her hat and then out into the summer night. A brisk five minute walk brought her to Mrs. Sykes' gate, and there, for the first time, she hesitated.

"Evening, Esther!" called Mrs. Sykes cheerfully from the veranda. "Come right along in. Mrs. Coombe told Ann you might be over to borrow the telescope valise if she decided to take Jane. Rather sudden, her going away, isn't it? Hadn't heard a word about it until the Ladies' Aid--come up and sit on the veranda and I'll get it."

"I didn't come for the telescope," said Esther. "I came to see Dr.

Callandar."

"Oh," with renewed interest. "Well, he's in. At least he's in unless he went out while I was upstairs putting Ann to bed. That's his consulting room where the light is. It's got a door of its own so folks won't be tramping up the hall--but of course you know. You were here this afternoon. Funny, Mrs. Coombe going away with your poor Auntie sick and all! I suppose it _is_ your Auntie, since it can't be Jane or Mrs. Coombe?"

"Yes, it is Aunt Amy. She has not been very well."

"The heat, likely. Heat is hard on folks with weak heads. Not that your Auntie's head ever seems weaker than lots of other folks. Won't you come up and sit awhile?--Well, ring the bell."

Mrs. Sykes voice trailed off indistinctly as Esther rounded the veranda corner and stood by the rose bush before the doctor's door. She pushed the new electric bell timidly.

"You'll have to push harder than that!" called Mrs. Sykes. "It sticks some!"

But the door had opened at once, letting out a flood of yellow light.

"Miss Coombe--you?"

"It's Esther Coombe come about her Aunt Amy," called the voice from the veranda.

Hastily the doctor drew her in and closed the door with an emphatic bang. Then for the second time that day they looked into each other's eyes and laughed.

"Do you think my patients will stand that?" he asked her ruefully.

"Oh, we are used to Mrs. Sykes, we don't mind."

"That's good! Ah, I see you have the mysterious prescription. It wasn't so hard after all, was it? Probably your mother was quite as anxious as you."

"No, she refused to let me show it you. I took it. To-night was the only chance, for she is going away to-morrow and will take it with her."

"And how about your Presbyterian conscience?" Still with a twinkle.

"Silenced, for the present. But look at it quickly for the silence may not last. It seemed that I simply had to help mother, in spite of herself. And there was no other way. All the same I shall despise myself when I get time to think."

The doctor took the paper with a smile. "When that time comes I shall argue with you, though argument rarely affects feeling. To my mind you are doing an eminently sensible thing."

He opened the paper and peered at it under the lamp; looked quickly up at the girl's eager face and then from her to the paper again.

"What is it?" she asked anxiously.

"Why--I don't know. Where did you get this?"

"In the secret drawer of father's desk."

"Was the prescription always kept there?"

"Yes."

The doctor folded the paper again and handed it to her. "Does this look like the prescription?"

"Yes, of course. It is the prescription."

"I'm afraid not. Come and look."

Esther seized the paper eagerly and saw--a neatly written recipe for salad dressing!

Hot and cold with mortification, she stared at it blankly. "I have been nicely fooled," she said in a low voice.

"Am I permitted to smile, or would it hurt your feelings?"

"It is not at all funny! Of course the real prescription has been removed. She must have suspected. You see, I asked her to let me have it. Oh!" with sudden shame and anger. "She guessed that I might take it, don't you see?"

"I am afraid you are right. But now at least I should think that you have done your whole duty. It would look as if Mrs. Coombe was herself aware of the inadvisability of continuing this prescription. Why else should she be so careful to prevent you showing it to me? At the same time she is determined to go on using it. We cannot prevent her."

"Can we do nothing?"

"When I see her I shall be better able to judge."

"But she is going away."

"Then we must wait. If it is, as I suspect, a case of disordered nerves aggravated by improper treatment, the instinct is strongly for concealment. Do you find, for instance, that Mrs. Coombe is not as frank in other matters as she used to be?"

A shamed blush crimsoned the girl's cheek, but the doctor's tone was compelling and she answered in a low voice: "Yes, I think so."

"Don't look like that. It is only a symptom of something rotten in the nervous system."