what a blessing to have the MEMORY of colours and of how they blend!
Think of the fellows who are BORN blind. And please ask Miss Gray to go out in the pine wood, or on the moor, or use the motor, or rest, or do anything she likes. Tell her to make herself quite at home; but on no account to come up here until Simpson reports me ready."
"You may rely on Nurse Gray to be most discreet," said Dr. Rob; whose voice had suddenly become very husky. "And as for getting up, laddie, don"t go too fast. You will not find your strength equal to much. But I am bound to tell you there is nothing to keep you in bed if you feel like rising."
"Good-bye, doctor," said Garth, groping for his hand; "and I am sorry I shall never be able to offer to paint Mrs. Mackenzie!"
"You"d have to paint her with a s.h.a.ggy head, four paws, and the softest amber eyes in the world," said Dr. Rob tenderly; "and, looking out from those eyes, the most faithful, loving dog-heart in creation. In all the years we"ve kept house together she has never failed to meet me with a welcome, never contradicted me or wanted the last word, and never worried me for so much as the price of a bonnet. There"s a woman for you!--Well, good-bye, lad, and G.o.d Almighty bless you. And be careful how you go. Do not be surprised if I look in again on my way back from my rounds to see how you like that chair."
Dr. Mackenzie held open the door. Jane pa.s.sed noiselessly out before him. He followed, signing to her to precede him down the stairs.
In the library, Jane turned and faced him. He put her quietly into a chair and stood before her. The bright blue eyes were moist, beneath the s.h.a.ggy brows.
"My dear," he said, "I feel myself somewhat of a blundering old fool.
You must forgive me. I never contemplated putting you through such an ordeal. I perfectly understand that, while he hesitated, you must have felt your whole career at stake. I see you have been weeping; but you must not take it too much to heart that our patient made so much of your voice resembling this Miss Champion"s. He will forget all about it in a day or two, and you will be worth more to him than a dozen Miss Champions. See what good you have done him already. Here he is wanting to get up and explain his pictures to you. Never you fear. You will soon win your way, and I shall be able to report to Sir Deryck what a fine success you have made of the case. Now I must see the valet and give him very full instructions. And I recommend you to go for a blow on the moor and get an appet.i.te for lunch. Only put on something warmer than that. You will have no sick-room work to do; and having duly impressed me with your washableness and serviceableness, you may as well wear something comfortable to protect you from our Highland nip.
Have you warmer clothing with you?"
"It is the rule of our guild to wear uniform," said Jane; "but I have a grey merino."
"Ah, I see. Well, wear the grey merino. I shall return in two hours to observe how he stands that move. Now, don"t let me keep you."
"Dr. Mackenzie," said Jane quietly, "may I ask why you described me as fair; and my very straight, heavy, plainly coiled hair, as fluffy, fly-away floss-silk?"
Dr. Rob had already reached the bell, but at her question he stayed his hand and, turning, met Jane"s steadfast eyes with the shrewd turquoise gleam of his own.
"Why certainly you may ask, Nurse Rosemary Gray," he said, "though I wonder you think it necessary to do so. It was of course perfectly evident to me that, for reasons of his own, Sir Deryck wished to paint an imaginary portrait of you to the patient, most likely representing some known ideal of his. As the description was so different from the reality, I concluded that, to make the portrait complete, the two touches unfortunately left to me to supply, had better be as unlike what I saw before me as the rest of the picture. And now, if you will be good enough--" Dr. Rob rang the bell violently.
"And why did you take the risk of suggesting that he should feel me?"
persisted Jane.
"Because I knew he was a gentleman," shouted Dr. Rob angrily. "Oh, come in, Simpson--come in, my good fellow--and shut that door! And G.o.d Almighty be praised that He made you and me MEN, and not women!"
A quarter of an hour later, Jane watched him drive away, thinking to herself: "Deryck was right. But what a queer mixture of shrewdness and obtuseness, and how marvellously it worked out to the furtherance of our plans."
But as she watched the dog-cart start off at a smart trot across the moor, she would have been more than a little surprised could she have overheard Dr. Rob"s muttered remarks to himself, as he gathered up the reins and cheered on his st.u.r.dy cob. He had a habit of talking over his experiences, half aloud, as he drove from case to case; the two sides of his rather complex nature apparently comparing notes with each other. And the present conversation opened thus:
"Now what has brought the Honourable Jane up here?" said Dr. Rob.
"Dashed if I know," said Dr. Mackenzie.
"You must not swear, laddie," said Dr. Rob; "you had a pious mother."
CHAPTER XX
JANE REPORTS PROGRESS
Letter from the Honourable Jane Champion to Sir Deryck Brand.
Castle Gleneesh, N. B.
My dear Deryck: My wires and post-cards have not told you much beyond the fact of my safe arrival. Having been here a fortnight, I think it is time I sent you a report. Only you must remember that I am a poor scribe. From infancy it has always been difficult to me to write anything beyond that stock commencement: "I hope you are quite well;"
and I approach the task of a descriptive letter with an effort which is colossal. And yet I wish I might, for once, borrow the pen of a ready writer; because I cannot help knowing that I have been pa.s.sing through experiences such as do not often fall to the lot of a woman.
Nurse Rosemary Gray is getting on capitally. She is making herself indispensable to the patient, and he turns to her with a completeness of confidence which causes her heart to swell with professional pride.
Poor Jane has got no further than hearing, from his own lips, that she is the very last person in the whole world he would wish should come near him in his blindness. When she was suggested as a possible visitor, he said: "Oh, my G.o.d, NO!" and his face was one wild, horrified protest. So Jane is getting her horsewhipping, Boy, and--according to the method of a careful and thoughtful judge, who orders thirty lashes of the "cat," in three applications of ten--so is Jane"s punishment laid on at intervals; not more than she can bear at a time; but enough to keep her heart continually sore, and her spirit in perpetual dread. And you, dear, clever doctor, are proved perfectly right in your diagnosis of the sentiment of the case. He says her pity would be the last straw on his already heavy cross; and the expression is an apt one, her pity for him being indeed a thing of straw. The only pity she feels is pity for herself, thus hopelessly caught in the meshes of her own mistake. But how to make him realise this, is the puzzle.
Do you remember how the Israelites were shut in, between Migdol and the sea? I knew Migdol meant "towers," but I never understood the pa.s.sage, until I stood upon that narrow wedge of desert, with the Red Sea in front and on the left; the rocky range of Gebel Attaka on the right, towering up against the sky, like the weird shapes of an impregnable fortress; the sole outlet or inlet behind, being the route they had just travelled from Egypt, and along which the chariots and hors.e.m.e.n of Pharaoh were then thundering in hot pursuit. Even so, Boy, is poor Jane now tramping her patch of desert, which narrows daily to the measure of her despair. Migdol is HIS certainty that HER love could only be pity.
The Red Sea is the confession into which she must inevitably plunge, to avoid scaling Migdol; in the chill waters of which, as she drags him in with her, his love is bound to drown, as waves of doubt and mistrust sweep over its head,--doubts which he has lost the power of removing; mistrust which he can never hope to prove to have been false and mistaken. And behind come galloping the hosts of Pharaoh; chance, speeding on the wheels of circ.u.mstance. At any moment some accident may compel a revelation; and instantly HE will be scaling rocky Migdol, with torn hands and bleeding feet; and she--poor Jane--floundering in the depths of the Red Sea. O for a Moses, with divine commission, to stretch out the rod of understanding love, making a safe way through; so that together they might reach the Promised Land! Dear wise old Boy, dare you undertake the role of Moses!
But here am I writing like a page of Baedeker, and failing to report on actual facts.
As you may suppose, Jane grows haggard and thin in spite of old Margery"s porridge--which is "put on" every day after lunch, for the next morning"s breakfast, and anybody pa.s.sing "gives it a stir." Did you know that was the right way to make porridge, Deryck? I always thought it was made in five minutes, as wanted. Margery says that must be the English stuff which profanely goes by the name. (N.B. Please mark the self-control with which I repeat Scotch remarks, without rushing into weird spelling; a senseless performance, it seems to me.
For if you know already how old Margery p.r.o.nounces "porridge," you can read her p.r.o.nunciation into the sentence; and if you do not know it, no grotesque spelling on my part could convey to your mind any but a caricatured version of the pretty Scotch accent with which Margery says: "Stir the porridge, Nurse Gray." In fact, I am agreeably surprised at the ease with which I understand the natives, and the pleasure I derive from their conversation; for, after wrestling with one or two modern novels dealing with the Highlands, I had expected to find the language an unknown tongue. Instead of which, lo! and behold, old Margery, Maggie the housemaid, Macdonald the gardener, and Macalister the game-keeper, all speak a rather purer English than I do; far more carefully p.r.o.nounced, and with every R sounded and rolled.
Their idioms are more characteristic than their accent. They say "whenever" for "when," and use in their verbs several quaint variations of tense.)
But what a syntactical digression! Oh, Boy, the wound at my heart is so deep and so sore that I dread the dressings, even by your delicate touch. Where was I? Ah, the porridge gave me my loophole of escape.
Well, as I was saying, Jane grows worn and thin, old Margery"s porridge notwithstanding; but Nurse Rosemary Gray is flourishing, and remains a pretty, dainty little thing, with the additional charm of fluffy, fly-away floss-silk, for hair,--Dr. Rob"s own unaided contribution to the fascinating picture. By the way, I was quite unprepared to find him such a character. I learn much from Dr. Mackenzie, and I love Dr. Rob, excepting on those occasions when I long to pick him up by the scruff of his fawn overcoat and drop him out of the window.
On the point of Nurse Rosemary"s personal appearance, I found it best to be perfectly frank with the household. You can have no conception how often awkward moments arose; as, for instance, in the library, the first time Garth came downstairs; when he ordered Simpson to bring the steps for Miss Gray, and Simpson opened his lips to remark that Nurse Gray could reach to the top shelf on her own tiptoes with the greatest ease, he having just seen her do it. Mercifully, the perfect training of an English man-servant saved the situation, and he merely said: "Yessir; certainly sir," and looked upon, me, standing silently by, as a person who evidently delighted in giving unnecessary trouble. Had it been dear old Margery with her Scotch tongue, which starts slowly, but gathers momentum as it rolls, and can never be arrested until the full flood of her thought has been poured forth, I should have been constrained to pick her up bodily in my dainty arms and carry her out.
So I sent for Simpson and Margery to the dining-room that evening, when the master was safely out of ear-shot, and told them that, for reasons which I could not fully explain, a very incorrect description of my appearance had been given him. He thought me small and slim; fair and very pretty; and it was most important, in order to avoid long explanations and mental confusion for him, that he should not at present be undeceived. Simpson"s expression of polite attention did not vary, and his only comment was: "Certainly, miss. Quite so." But across old Margery"s countenance, while I was speaking, pa.s.sed many shades of opinion, which, fortunately, by the time I had finished, crystallized into an approving smile of acquiescence. She even added her own commentary: "And a very good thing, too, I am thinking. For Master Garth, poor laddie, was always so set upon having beauty about him.
"Master Garthie," I would say to him, when he had friends coming, and all his ideas in talking over the dinner concerned the cleaning up of the old silver, and putting out of Valentine gla.s.s and Worstered china; "Master Garthie," I would say, feeling the occasion called for the apt quoting of Scripture, "it appears to me your attention is given entirely to the outside of the cup and platter, and you care nothing for all the good things that lie within." So it is just as well to keep him deceived, Miss Gray." And then, as Simpson coughed tactfully behind his hand, and nudged her very obviously with his elbow, she added, as a sympathetic after-thought: "For, though a homey face may indeed be redeemed by its kindly expression, you cannot very well explain expression to the blind." So you see, Deryck, this shrewd old body, who has known Garth from boyhood, would have entirely agreed with the decision of three years ago.
Well, to continue my report. The voice gave us some trouble, as you foresaw, and the whole plan hung in the balance during a few awful moments; for, though he easily accepted the explanation we had planned, he sent me out, and told Dr. Mackenzie my voice in his room would madden him. Dr. Rob was equal to the occasion, and won the day; and Garth, having once given in, never mentioned the matter again. Only, sometimes I see him listening and remembering.
But Nurse Rosemary Gray has beautiful hours when poor anxious, yearning Jane is shut out. For her patient turns to her, and depends on her, and talks to her, and tries to reach her mind, and shows her his, and is a wonderful person to live with and know. Jane, marching about in the cold, outside, and hearing them talk, realises how little she understood the beautiful gift which was laid at her feet; how little she had grasped the nature and mind of the man whom she dismissed as "a mere boy." Nurse Rosemary, sitting beside him during long sweet hours of companionship, is learning it; and Jane, ramping up and down her narrowing strip of desert, tastes the sirocco of despair.
And now I come to the point of my letter, and, though I am a woman, I will not put it in a postscript.
Deryck, can you come up soon, to pay him a visit, and to talk to me? I don"t think I can bear it, unaided, much longer; and he would so enjoy having you, and showing you how he had got on, and all the things he had already learned to do. Also you might put in a word for Jane; or at all events, get at his mind on the subject. Oh, Boy, if you COULD spare forty-eight hours! And a breath of the moors would be good for you.
Also I have a little private plan, which depends largely for its fulfilment on your coming. Oh, Boy--come!
Yours, needing you,
Jeanette.
From Sir Deryck Brand to Nurse Rosemary Gray, Castle Gleneesh, N. B.
Wimpole Street.
My dear Jeanette: Certainly I will come. I will leave Euston on Friday evening. I can spend the whole of Sat.u.r.day and most of Sunday at Gleneesh, but must be home in time for Monday"s work.
I will do my best, only, alas! I am not Moses, and do not possess his wonder-working rod. Moreover, latest investigations have proved that the Israelites could not have crossed at the place you mention, but further north at the Bitter Lakes; a mere matter of detail, in no way affecting the extreme appositeness of your ill.u.s.tration, rather, adding to it; for I fear there are bitter waters ahead of you, my poor girl.