A Perilous Secret Part 26

This eulogy was interrupted by Mary putting a white hand and a perfect nose upon Hope's shoulder, and kissing the cloth thereon.

"What," said Hope, tenderly, and yet half sadly--for he knew that all middle-aged men must now be second--"have I found the way to your heart?"

"You always knew that, Mr. Hope," said Mary, softly; "especially since my escapade in that horrid brook."

Their affectionate chat was interrupted by a stout servant laying a snowy cloth, and after her sailed in Mrs. Gilbert, with a red face, and pride unconcealed and justifiable, carrying a grand dish of smoking hot boiled beef, set in a very flower bed, so to speak, of carrots, turnips, and suet dumplings; the servant followed with a brown basin, almost as big as a ewer, filled with mealy potatoes, whose jackets hung by a thread.

Around this feast the whole party soon collected, and none of them sighed for Russian soups or French ragouts; for the fact is that under the t.i.tle of boiled beef there exist two things, one of which, without any great impropriety, might be called junk; but this was the powdered beef of our ancestors, a huge piece just slightly salted in the house itself, so that the generous juice remained in it, but the piquant slices, with the mealy potatoes, made a delightful combination. The gla.s.ses were filled with home-brewed ale, sparkling and clear and golden as the finest Madeira.

They all ate manfully, stimulated by the genial hostess. Even Mary outshone all her former efforts, and although she couldn't satisfy Mrs.

Gilbert, she declared she had never eaten so much in all her life. This set good Mrs. Gilbert's cheeks all aglow with simple, honest satisfaction.

Hope drove Mary home in the dog-cart. He was a happy man, but she could hardly be called a happy woman. She was warm and cold by turns. She had got her friend back, and that was a comfort, but she was not treating him with confidence; indeed, she was pa.s.sively deceiving him, and that chilled her; but then it would not be for long, and that comforted her, and yet even when the day should come for the great doors of Clifford Hall to fly open to her, would not a sad, reproachful look from dear Mr.

Hope somewhat imbitter her cup of happiness? Deceit, and even reticence, did not come so natural to her as they do to many women: she was not weak, and she was frank, though very modest.

Mr. Bartley met them at the door, and, owing to Hope's presence, was more demonstrative than usual. He seemed much pleased at Mary's return, and delighted at her appearance.

"Well," said he, "I am glad I sent you away for a week. We have all missed you, my dear, but the change has set you up again, I never saw you look better. Now you are well, we must try and keep you well."

We must leave the reader to imagine the mixed feelings with which Mrs.

Walter Clifford laid her head upon the pillow that night, and we undertake to say that the female readers, at all events, will supply this blank in our narrative much better than we could, though we were to fill a chapter with that subject alone.

Pa.s.sion is a terrible enemy to mere affection. Walter Clifford loved his father dearly, yet for twenty-four hours he had almost forgotten him.

But the moment he turned his horse's head toward Clifford Hall, uneasiness and something very like remorse began to seize him. Suppose his father had asked for him, and wondered where he was, and felt himself deserted and abandoned in his dying moments. He spurred his horse to a gallop, and soon reached Clifford Hall. As he was afraid to go straight to his father's room, he went at once to old Baker, and said, in an agitated voice,

"One word, John--is he alive?"

"Yes, sir, he is," said John, gravely, and rather sternly.

"Has he asked for me?"

"More than once or twice, sir."

Walter sank into a chair, and covered his face with his hands. This softened the old servant, whose manner till then had been sullen and grim.

"You need not fret, Mr. Walter," said he; "it's all right. In course I know where you have been."

Walter looked up alarmed.

"I mean in a general way," said the old man. "You have been a-courting of an angel. I know her, sir, and I hope to be her servant some day; and if you was to marry any but her, I'd leave service altogether, and so would Rhoda Milton; but, Mr. Walter, sir, there's a time for everything: I hope you'll forgive me for saying so. However you are here now, and I was wide-awake, and I have made it all right, sir."

"That's impossible," said Walter. "How could you make it right with my poor dear father, if in his last moments he felt himself neglected?"

"But he didn't feel himself neglected."

"I don't understand you," said Walter.

"Well, sir," said old Baker, "I'm an old servant, and I have done my duty to father and son according to my lights: I told him a lie."

"A lie, John!" said Walter.

"A thundering lie," said John, rather aggressively. "I don't know as I ever told a greater lie in all my life. I told him you was gone up to London to fetch a doctor."

Walter grasped John Baker's hand. "G.o.d bless you, old man," said he, "for taking that on your conscience! Well, you sha'n't have yourself to reproach for my fault. I know a first-cla.s.s gout doctor in London; he has cured it more than once. I'll wire him down this minute; you'll dispatch the message, and I'll go to my father."

The message was sent, and when the Colonel awoke from an uneasy slumber he saw his son at the foot of the bed, gazing piteously at him.

"My dear boy," said he, faintly, and held out a wasted hand. Walter was p.r.i.c.ked to the heart at this greeting: not a word of remonstrance at his absence.

"I fear you missed me, father," said he, sadly.

"That I have," said the old man; "but I dare say you didn't forget me, though you weren't by my side."

The high-minded old soldier said no more, and put no questions, but confided in his son's affection, and awaited the result of it. From that hour Walter Clifford nursed his father day and night. Dr. Garner arrived next day. He examined the patient, and put a great many questions as to the history and progress of the disorder up to that date, and inquired in particular what was the length of time the fits generally endured.

Here he found them all rather hazy. "Ah," said he, "patients are seldom able to a.s.sist their medical adviser with precise information on this point, yet it's very important. Well, can you tell me how long this attack has lasted?"

They told him that within a day or two.

"Then now," said he, "the most important question of all: What day did the pain leave his extremities?"

The patient and John Baker had to compare notes to answer this question, and they made it out to be about twenty days.

"Then he ought to be as dead as a herring," whispered the doctor.

After this he began to walk the room and meditate, with his hands behind him.

"Open those top windows," said he. "Now draw the screen, and give his lungs a chance; no draughts must blow upon him, you know." Then he drew Walter aside. "Do you want to know the truth? Well, then, his life hangs on a thread. The gout is creeping upward, and will inevitably kill him if we can't get it down. Nothing but heroic remedies will do that, and it's three to five against them. What do you say?"

"I dare not--I dare not. Pray put the question to _him_."

"I will," said the doctor; and accordingly he did put it to him with a good deal of feeling and gentleness, and the answer rather surprised him.

Weak as he was, Colonel Clifford's dull eye flashed, and he half raised himself on his elbow. "What a question to put to a soldier!" said he.

"Why, let us fight, to be sure. I thought it was twenty to one--five to three? I have often won the rubber with five to three against me."

"Ah!" said Dr. Garner, "these are the patients that give the doctor a chance." Then he turned to Baker. "Have you any good champagne in the house--not sweet, and not too dry, and full of fire?"

"Irroy's Carte d'Or," suggested the patient, entering into the business with a certain feeble alacrity that showed his gout had not always been unconnected with imprudence in diet.

Baker was sent for the champagne. It was brought and opened, and the patient drank some of it fizzing. When he had drank what he could, his eyes twinkled, and he said,

"That's a hair of a dog that has often bitten me."

The wine soon got into his weakened head, and he dropped asleep.

"Another draught when he wakes," said the doctor, "but from a fresh bottle."