"He said something about it being the only reparation he could make you; but his voice was not very clear or distinct, and I could n"t be sure I caught his words correctly."
"Reparation! he owed me none."
"Well, well, it is possible I may have mistaken him. One thing is plain enough; you cannot give me any clew to this seizure beyond the guess that it may have been some tidings he received by post."
L"Estrange shook his head in silence, and after a moment said, "Is the attack serious?"
"Highly so."
"And is his life in danger?"
"A few hours will decide that, but it may be days before we shall know if his mind will recover. Craythorpe has been sent for from Dublin, and we shall have his opinion this evening. I have no hesitation in saying that mine is unfavorable."
"What a dreadful thing, and how fearfully sudden. I cannot conceive how he could have bethought him of the letter for me at such a moment."
"He wrote it, he said, as you left him; you had not quitted the house when he began. He said to me, "I saw I was growing worse, I felt my confusion was gaining on me, and a strange commixture of people and events was occurring in my head; so I swept all my letters and papers into a drawer and locked it, wrote the few lines I had promised, and with my almost last effort of consciousness rang the bell for my servant.""
"But he was quite collected when he told you this?"
"Yes, it was in one of those lucid intervals when the mind shines out clear and brilliant; but the effort cost him dearly: he has not rallied from it since."
"Has he over-worked himself; is this the effect of an over-exerted brain?"
"I "d call it rather the result of some wounded sensibility; he appears to have suffered some great reverse in ambition or in fortune. His tone, so far as I can fathom it, implies intense depression. After all, we must say he met much coldness here. The people did not visit him, there was no courtesy, no kindliness shown him; and though he seemed indifferent to it, who knows how he may have felt it?"
"I do not suspect he gave any encouragement to intimacy; beseemed to me as if declining acquaintance with the neighborhood."
"Ay, but it was in resentment, I opine; but _you_ ought to know best.
You were constantly here?"
"Yes, very frequently; but I am not an observant person; all the little details which convey a whole narrative to others are utterly lost upon _me_."
The doctor smiled. It was an expression that appeared to say he concurred in the curate"s version of his own nature.
"It is these small gifts of combining, arranging, sifting, and testing, that we doctors have to cultivate," said he, as he took his hat. "The patient the most eager to be exact and truthful will, in spite of himself, mislead and misguide us. There is a strange bend sinister in human nature, against sincerity, that will indulge itself even at the cost of life itself. You are the physician of the soul, sir; but take my word for it, you might get many a shrewd hint and many a useful suggestion from us, the meaner workmen who only deal with nerves and arteries."
As he wended his solitary road homewards, L"Estrange pondered thoughtfully over the doctor"s words. He had no need, he well knew, to be reminded of his ignorance of mankind; but here was a new view of it, and it seemed immeasurable.
On the whole he was a sadder man than usual on that day. The world around him--that narrow circle whose diameter was perhaps a dozen miles or so--was very sombre in its coloring. He had left sickness and sorrow in a house where he had hitherto only seen festivity and pleasure; and worse again, as regarded himself, he had carried away none of those kindlier sympathies and friendly feelings which were wont to greet him at the great house. Were they really then changed to him? and if so, why so? There is a moral chill in the sense of estrangement from those we have lived with on terms of friendship that, like the shudder that precedes ague, seems to threaten that worse will follow. Julia would see where the mischief lay had she been in his place. Julia would have read the mystery, if there were a mystery, from end to end; but _he_, he felt it,--he had no powers of observation, no quickness, no tact. He saw nothing that lay beneath the surface, nor, indeed, much that was on the surface. All that he knew was, that at the moment when his future was more uncertain than ever, he found himself more isolated and friendless than ever he remembered to have been. The only set-off against all this sense of desertion was the letter which Colonel Bramleigh had written in his behalf, and which he had remembered to write as he lay suffering on his sick bed. He had told the doctor where to find it, and said it lay sealed and directed. The address was there, but no seal. It was placed in an open envelope, on which was written, "Favored by the Rev. G.
L"Estrange." Was the omission of the seal accident or intention? Most probably accident, because he spoke of having sealed it. And yet that might have been a mere phrase to imply that the letter was finished.
Such letters were probably, in most cases, either open, or only closed after being read by him who bore them. Julia would know this. Julia would be able to clear up this point, thought he, as he pondered and plodded homeward.
CHAPTER XXIV. DOUBTS AND FEARS.
"And here is the letter, Julia," said L"Estrange, as they sat at tea together that same evening. "Here is the letter; and if I were as clever a casuist as Colonel Bramleigh thought me, I should perhaps know whether I have the right to read it or not."
"Once I have begun to discuss such a point, I distrust my judgment; but when I p.r.o.nounce promptly, suddenly, out of mere woman"s instinct, I have great faith in myself."
"And how does your woman"s instinct incline here?"
"Not to read it. It may or may not have been the writer"s intention to have sealed it; the omission was possibly a mere accident. At all events, to have shown you the contents would have been a courtesy at the writer"s option. He was not so inclined--"
"Stop a bit, Julia," cried he, laughing. "Here you are arguing the case, after having given me the instinctive impulse that would not wait for logic. Now, I"ll not stand "floggee and preachee" too."
"Don"t you see, sir," said she, with a mock air of being offended, "that the very essence of this female instinct is its being the perception of an inspired process of reasoning, an instinctive sense of right, that did not require a mental effort to arrive at?"
"And this instinctive sense of right says, Don"t read?"
"Exactly so."
"Well, I don"t agree with you," said he, with a sigh. "I don"t know, and I want to know, in what light Colonel Bramleigh puts me forward.
Am I a friend? am I a dependent? am I a man worth taking some trouble about? or am I merely, as I overheard him saying to Lord Culduff, "a young fellow my boys are very fond of"?"
"Oh, George. You never told me this."
"Because it"s not safe to tell you anything. You are sure to resent things you ought never to show you have known. I"d lay my life on it that had you heard that speech, you"d have contrived to introduce it into some narrative or some description before a week went over."
"Well, it"s a rule of war, if the enemy fire unfair ammunition, you may send it back to him."
"And then," said L"Estrange, reverting to his own channel of thought, "and then it"s not impossible that it might be such a letter as I would not have stooped to present."
"If I were a man, nothing would induce me to accept a letter of introduction to any one," said she, boldly. "It puts every one concerned in a false position. "Give the bearer ten pounds" is intelligible; but when the request is, "Be polite to the gentleman who shall deliver this; invite him to dine; present him to your wife and daughters; give him currency amongst your friends;" all because of certain qualities which have met favor with some one else; why, this subverts every principle of social intercourse; this strikes at the root of all that lends a charm to intimacy. _I_ want to find out the people who suit me in life, just as I want to display the traits that may attract others to _me_."
"I"d like to know what"s inside this," said L"Estrange, who only half followed what she was saying.
"Shall I tell you?" said she, gravely.
"Do, if you can."
"Here it is: "The bearer of this is a young fellow who has been our parson for some time back, and now wants to be yours at Albano. There"s not much harm in him; he is well-born, well-mannered, preaches but twelve minutes, and rides admirably to hounds. Do what you can for him; and believe me yours truly."
"If I thought--"
"Of course you "d put it in the fire," said she, finishing his speech; "and I"d have put it there though it should contain something exactly the reverse of all this."
"The doctor told me that Bramleigh said something about a reparation that he owed me; and although the phrase, coming from a man in his state, might mean nothing, or next to nothing, it still keeps recurring to my mind, and suggesting an eager desire to know what he could point to."
"Perhaps his conscience p.r.i.c.ked him, George, for not having made more of you while here. I "d almost say it might with some justice."
"I think they have shown us great attention--have been most hospitable and courteous to us."
"I "m not a fair witness, for I have no sort of grat.i.tude for social civilities. I think it"s always the host is the obliged person."
"I know you do," said he, smiling.