Beatrice a.s.sented, and was silent again while they went on talking.
"Aunt Mary has held out wonderfully?" said her mother.
"Too wonderfully," said Mr. Geoffrey Langford, "in a way which I fear will cost her dearly. I have been positively longing to see her give way as she ought to have done under the fatigue; and now I am afraid of the old complaint: she puts her hand to her side now and then, and I am persuaded that she had some of those spasms a night or two ago."
"Ah!" said his wife, with great concern, "that is just what I have been dreading the whole time. When she consulted Dr. ----, how strongly he forbade her to use any kind of exertion. Why would you not let me come?
I a.s.sure you it was all I could do to keep myself from setting off."
"It was very well behaved in you, indeed, Beatrice," said he, smiling; "a sacrifice which very few husbands would have had resolution either to make themselves, or to ask of their wives. I thanked you greatly when I did not see you."
"But why would you not have me? Do you not repent it now?"
"Not in the least. Fred would let no one come near him but his mother and me; you could not have saved either of us an hour"s nursing then, whereas now you can keep Fred in order, and take care of Mary, if she will suffer it, and that she will do better from you than from any one else."
They were now reaching the entrance of Sutton Leigh Lane, and Queen Bee was called upon for the full history of the accident, which, often as it had been told by letter, must again be narrated in all its branches.
Even her father had never had time to hear it completely; and there was so much to ask and to answer on the merely external circ.u.mstances, that they had not begun to enter upon feelings and thoughts when they arrived at the gate of the paddock, which was held open by d.i.c.k and w.i.l.l.y, excessively delighted to see Aunt Geoffrey.
In a few moments more she was affectionately welcomed by old Mrs.
Langford, whose sentiments with regard to the two Beatrices were of a curiously varying and always opposite description. When her daughter-in-law was at a distance, she secretly regarded with a kind of respectful aversion, both her talents, her learning, and the fashionable life to which she had been accustomed; but in her presence the winning, lively simplicity of her manners completely dispelled all these prejudices in an instant, and she loved her most cordially for her own sake, as well as because she was Geoffrey"s wife. On the contrary, the younger Beatrice, while absent, was the dear little granddaughter,--the Queen of Bees, the cleverest of creatures; and while present, it has already been shown how constantly the two tempers fretted each other, or had once done so, though now, so careful had Busy Bee lately been, there had been only one collision between them for the last ten days, and that was caused by her strenuous attempts to convince grandmamma that Fred was not yet fit for boiled chicken and calves" foot jelly.
Mrs. Langford"s greetings were not half over when Henrietta and her mamma hastened down stairs to embrace dear Aunt Geoffrey.
"My dear Mary, I am so glad to be come to you at last!"
"Thank you, O! thank you, Beatrice. How Fred will enjoy having you now!"
"Is he tired?" asked Uncle Geoffrey.
"No, not at all; he seems to be very comfortable. He has been talking of Queen Bee"s promised visit. Do you like to go up now, my dear?"
Queen Bee consented eagerly, though with some trepidation, for she had not seen her cousin since his accident, and besides, she did not know how to begin about Philip Carey. She ran to take off her bonnet, while Henrietta went to announce her coming. She knocked at the door, Henrietta opened it, and coming in, she saw Fred lying on the sofa by the fire, in his dressing-gown, stretched out in that languid listless manner that betokens great feebleness. There were the purple marks of leeches on his temples; his hair had been cropped close to his head; his face was long and thin, without a shade of colour, but his eyes looked large and bright; and he smiled and held out his hand: "Ah, Queenie, how d"ye do?"
"How d"ye do, Fred? I am glad you are better."
"You see I have the a.s.ses" ears after all," said he, pointing to his own, which were very prominent in his shorn and shaven condition.
Beatrice could not very easily call up a smile, but she made an effort, and succeeded, while she said, "I should have complimented you on the increased wisdom of your looks. I did not know the shape of your head was so like papa"s."
"Is Aunt Geoffrey come?" asked Fred.
"Yes," said his sister: "but mamma thinks you had better not see her till to-morrow."
"I wish Uncle Geoffrey was not going," said Fred. "n.o.body else has the least notion of making one tolerably comfortable."
"O, your mamma, Fred!" said Queen Bee.
"O yes, mamma, of course! But then she is getting f.a.gged."
"Mamma says she is quite unhappy to have kept him so long from his work in London," said Henrietta; "but I do not know what we should have done without him."
"I do not know what we shall do now," said Fred, in a languid and doleful tone.
The Queen Bee, thinking this a capital opportunity, spoke with almost alarmed eagerness, "O yes, Fred, you will get on famously; you will enjoy having my mamma so much, and you are so much better already, and Philip Carey manages you so well--"
"Manages!" said Fred; "ay, and I"ll tell you how, Queenie; just as the man managed his mare when he fed her on a straw a day. I believe he thinks I am a ghool, and can live on a grain of rice. I only wish he knew himself what starvation is. Look here! you can almost see the fire through my hand, and if I do but lift up my head, the whole room is in a merry-go-round. And that is nothing but weakness; there is nothing else on earth the matter with me, except that I am starved down to the strength of a midge!"
"Well, but of course he knows," said Busy Bee; "Papa says he has had an excellent education, and he must know."
"To be sure he does, perfectly well: he is a sharp fellow, and knows how to keep a patient when he has got one."
"How can you talk such nonsense, Fred? One comfort is, that it is a sign you are getting well, or you would not have spirits to do it."
"I am talking no nonsense," said Fred, sharply; "I am as serious as possible."
"But you can"t really think that if Philip was capable of acting in such an atrocious way, that papa would not find it out, and the other doctor too?"
"What! when that man gets I don"t know how many guineas from mamma every time he comes, do you think that it is for his interest that I should get well?"
"My dear Fred," interposed his sister, "you are exciting yourself, and that is so very bad for you."
"I do a.s.sure you, Henrietta, you would find it very little exciting to be shut up in this room with half a teaspoonful of wishy-washy pudding twice a day, and all just to fill Philip Carey"s pockets! Now, there was old Clarke at Rocksand, he had some feeling for one, poor old fellow; but this man, not the slightest compunction has he; and I am ready to kick him out of the room when I hear that silky voice of his trying to be gen-tee-eel, and condoling; and those boots--O! Busy Bee! those boots! whenever he makes a step I always hear them say, "O what a pretty fellow I am!""
"You seem to be very merry here, my dears," said Aunt Mary, coming in; "but I am afraid you will tire yourself, Freddy; I heard your voice even before I opened the door."
Fred was silent, a little ashamed, for he had sense enough not absolutely to believe all that he had been saying, and his mother, sitting down, began to talk to the visitor, "Well, my little Queen, we have seen very little of you of late, but we shall be very sorry to lose you. I suppose your mamma will have all your letters, and Henrietta must not expect any, but we shall want very much to know how you get on with Aunt Susan and her little dog."
"O very well, I dare say," said Beatrice, rather absently, for she was looking at her aunt"s delicate fragile form, and thinking of what her father had been saying.
"And Queenie," continued her aunt, earnestly, "you must take great care of your papa--make him rest, and listen to your music, and read story-books instead of going back to his work all the evening."
"To be sure I shall, Aunt Mary, as much as I possibly can."
"But Bee," said Fred, "you don"t mean that you are going to be shut up with that horrid Lady Susan all this time? Why don"t you stay here, and let her take care of herself?"
"Mamma would not like that; and besides, to do her justice, she is really ill, Fred," said Beatrice.
"It is too bad, now I am just getting better--if they would let me, I mean," said Fred: "just when I could enjoy having you, and now there you go off to that old woman. It is a downright shame."
"So it is, Fred," said Queen Bee gaily, but not coquettishly, as once she would have answered him, "a great shame in you not to have learned to feel for other people, now you know what it is to be ill yourself."
"That is right, Bee," said Aunt Mary, smiling; "tell him he ought to be ashamed of having monopolized you all so long, and spoilt all the comfort of your household. I am sure I am," added she, her eyes filling with tears, as she affectionately patted Beatrice"s hand.
Queen Bee"s heart was very full, but she knew that to give way to the expression of her feelings would be hurtful to Fred, and she only pressed her aunt"s long thin fingers very earnestly, and turned her face to the fire, while she struggled down the rising emotion. There was a little silence, and when they began to talk again, it was of the engravings at which Fred had just been looking. The visit lasted till the dressing bell rang, when Beatrice was obliged to go, and she shook hands with Fred, saying cheerfully, "Well, good-bye, I hope you will be better friends with the doctors next time I see you."
"Never will I like one inch of a doctor, never!" repeated Fred, as she left the room, and ran to s.n.a.t.c.h what moments she could with her mamma in the s.p.a.ce allowed for dressing.
Grandmamma was happy that evening, for, except poor Frederick"s own place, there were no melancholy gaps at the dinner-table. He had Bennet to sit with him, and besides, there was within call the confidential old man-servant, who had lived so many years at Rocksand, and in whom both Fred and his mother placed considerable dependence.
Everything looked like recovery; Mrs. Frederick Langford came down and talked and smiled like her own sweet self; Mrs. Geoffrey Langford was ready to hear all the news, old Mr. Langford was quite in spirits again, Henrietta was bright and lively. The thought of long days in London with Lady Susan, and of long evenings with no mamma, and with papa either writing or at his chambers, began from force of contrast to seem doubly like banishment to poor little Queen Bee, but whatever faults she had, she was no repiner. "I deserve it," said she to herself, "and surely I ought to bear my share of the trouble my wilfulness has occasioned.