"Hold your ---- tongue, he"s coming to."
Henry did recover his wits enough to speak; and what do you think was his first word?
He clasped his hands together, and said,--"MY MOTHER! OH, DON"T LET HER KNOW!"
This simple cry went through many a rough heart; a loud gulp or two were heard soon after, and more than one hard and coaly cheek was channeled by sudden tears. But now a burly figure came rolling in; they drew back and silenced each other.--"The Doctor!" This was the remarkable person they called Jack Doubleface. Nature had stuck a philosophic head, with finely-cut features, and a mouth brimful of finesse, on to a corpulent and ungraceful body, that yawed from side to side as he walked.
The man of art opened with two words. He looked up at the white cloud, which was now floating away; sniffed the air, and said, "Gunpowder!"
Then he looked down at Little, and said, "Ah!" half dryly, half sadly.
Indeed several sentences of meaning condensed themselves into that simple interjection. At this moment, some men, whom curiosity had drawn to Henry"s forge, came back to say the forge had been blown up, and "the bellows torn limb from jacket, and the room strewed with ashes."
The doctor laid a podgy hand on the prisoner"s wrist: the touch was light, though the fingers were thick and heavy. The pulse, which had been very low, was now galloping and bounding frightfully. "Fetch him a gla.s.s of brandy-and-water," said Dr. Amboyne. (There were still doctors in Hillsborough, though not in London, who would have had him bled on the spot.)
"Now, then, a surgeon! Which of you lads operates on the eye, in these works?"
A lanky file-cutter took a step forward. "I am the one that takes the motes out of their eyes."
"Then be good enough to show me his eye."
The file-cutter put out a hand with fingers prodigiously long and thin, and deftly parted both Little"s eyelids with his finger and thumb, so as to show the whole eye.
"Hum!" said the doctor, and shook his head.
He then patted the sufferer all over, and the result of that examination was satisfactory. Then came the brandy-and-water; and while Henry"s teeth were clattering at the gla.s.s and he was trying to sip the liquid, Dr. Amboyne suddenly lifted his head, and took a keen survey of the countenances round him. He saw the general expression of pity on the rugged faces. He also observed one rough fellow who wore a strange wild look: the man seemed puzzled, scared, confused like one half awakened from some hideous dream. This was the grinder who had come into the works in place of the hand Cheetham had discharged for refusing to grind c.o.c.kney blades.
"Hum!" said Dr. Amboyne, and appeared to be going into a brown study.
But he shook that off, and said briskly, "Now, then, what was his crime?
Did he owe some mutual aid society six-and-four-pence?"
"That"s right," said Reynolds, sullenly, "throw every thing on the Union. If we knew who it was, he"d lie by the side of this one in less than a minute, and, happen, not get up again so soon." A growl of a.s.sent confirmed the speaker"s words. Cheetham interposed and drew Amboyne aside, and began to tell him who the man was and what the dispute; but Amboyne cut the latter explanation short. "What," said he, "is this the carver whose work I saw up at Mr. Carden"s?"
"This is the very man, no doubt."
"Why, he"s a sculptor: Praxiteles in wood. A fine choice they have made for their gunpowder, a workman that did honor to the town."
A faint flush of gratified pride colored the ghastly cheek a moment.
"Doctor, shall I live to finish the bust?" said Henry, piteously.
"That and hundreds more, if you obey me. The fact is, Mr. Cheetham, this young man is not hurt, but his nerves have received a severe shock; and the sooner he is out of this place the better. Ah, there is my brougham at the gate. Come, put him into it, and I"ll take him to the infirmary."
"No," said Little, "I won"t go there; my mother would hear of it."
"Oh, then your mother is not to know?"
"Not for all the world! She has had trouble enough. I"ll just wash my face and buy a clean shirt, and she"ll never know what has happened. It would kill her. Oh, yes, it would kill her!"
The doctor eyed him with warm approval. "You are a fine young fellow.
I"ll see you safe through this, and help you throw dust in your mother"s eyes. If you go to her with that scratched face, we are lost. Come, get into my carriage, and home with me."
"Mayn"t I wash my face first? And look at my shirt: as black as a cinder."
"Wash your face, by all means: but you can b.u.t.ton your coat over your shirt."
The coat was soon brought, and so was a pail of water and a piece of yellow soap. Little dashed his head and face into the bucket, and soon inked all the water. The explosion had filled his hair with black dust, and grimed his face and neck like a sweep"s. This ablution made him clean, but did not bring back his ruddy color. He looked pale and scratched.
The men helped him officiously into the carriage, though he could have walked very well alone.
Henry asked leave to buy a clean shirt. The doctor said he would lend him one at home.
While Henry was putting it on Dr. Amboyne ordered his dog-cart instead of his brougham, and mixed some medicines. And soon Henry found himself seated in the dog-cart, with a warm cloak over him, and whisking over the stones of Hillsborough.
All this had been done so rapidly and unhesitatingly that Henry, injured and shaken as he was, had yielded pa.s.sive obedience. But now he began to demur a little. "But where are we going, sir?" he asked.
"To change the air and the scene. I"ll be frank with you--you are man enough to bear the truth--you have received a shock that will very likely bring on brain-fever, unless you get some sleep tonight. But you would not sleep in Hillsborough. You"d wake a dozen times in the night, trembling like an aspen leaf, and fancying you were blown up again."
"Yes, but my mother, sir! If I don"t go home at seven o"clock, she"ll find me out."
"If you went crazy wouldn"t she find you out? Come, my young friend, trust to my experience, and to the interest this attempt to murder you, and your narrow escape, have inspired in me. When I have landed you in the Temple of Health, and just wasted a little advice on a pig-headed patient in the neighborhood (he is the squire of the place), I"ll drive back to Hillsborough, and tell your mother some story or other: you and I will concoct that together as we go."
At this Henry was all obedience, and indeed thanked him, with the tears in his eyes, for his kindness to a poor stranger.
Dr. Amboyne smiled. "If you were not a stranger, you would know that saving cutlers" lives is my hobby, and one in which I am steadily resisted and defeated, especially by the cutlers themselves: why, I look upon you as a most considerate and obliging young man for indulging me in this way. If you had been a Hillsborough hand, you would insist upon a brain-fever, and a trip to the lunatic asylum, just to vex me, and hinder me of my hobby."
Henry stared. This was too eccentric for him to take it all in at once.
"What!" said Dr. Amboyne, observing his amazement, "Did you never hear of Dr. Doubleface?"
"No, sir."
"Never hear of the corpulent lunatic, who goes about the city chanting, like a cuckoo, "Put yourself in his place--put yourself in her place--in their place?"
"No, sir, I never did."
"Then such is fame. Well, never mind that just now; there"s a time for every thing. Please observe that ruined house: the ancient family to whom it belongs are a remarkable example of the vicissitude of human affairs." He then told him the curious ups and downs of that family, which, at two distant periods, had held vast possessions in the county; but were now represented by the sh.e.l.l of one manor house, and its dovecote, the size of a modern villa. Next he showed him an obscure battlefield, and told him that story, and who were the parties engaged; and so on. Every mile furnished its legend, and Dr. Amboyne related them all so graphically that the patient"s mind was literally stolen away from himself. At last, after a rapid drive of eleven miles through the pure invigorating air, they made a sudden turn, and entered a pleasant and singularly rural village: they drew up at a rustic farmhouse, clad with ivy; and Dr. Amboyne said, "This is the temple: here you can sleep as safe from gunpowder as a field-marshal born."
The farmer"s daughter came out, and beamed pleasure at sight of the doctor: he got down, and told her the case, privately, and gave her precise instructions. She often interrupted the narrative with "Lawkadaisies," and other rural interjections, and simple exclamations of pity. She promised faithful compliance with his orders.
He then beckoned Henry in, and said, "This picture of health was a patient of mine once, as you are now; there"s encouragement for you. I put you under her charge. Get a letter written to your mother, and I"ll come back for it in half an hour. You had a headache, and were feverish, so you consulted a doctor. He advised immediate rest and change of air, and he drove you at once to this village. Write you that, and leave the rest to me. We doctors are dissembling dogs. We have still something to learn in curing diseases; but at making light of them to the dying, and other branches of amiable mendacity, we are masters."
As soon as he was gone, the comely young hostess began on her patient.
"Dear heart, sir, was it really you as was blowed up with gunpowder?"
"Indeed it was, and not many hours ago. It seems like a dream."
"Well, now, who"d think that, to look at you? Why, you are none the worse for, by a scratch or two, and dear heart, I"ve seen a young chap bring as bad home, from courting, in these parts; and wed the la.s.s as marked him--within the year."
"Oh, it is not the scratches; but feel my hand, how it trembles. And it used to be as firm as a rock; for I never drink."