Bella Donna Part 103

"Really, I think I'd much rather. I've got friends waiting for me at a.s.souan."

"And I've got n.o.body waiting for me. Suppose the patient agrees, and you continue in the same mind, I'm willing to relieve you of all responsibility and take the whole thing into my own hands. And if at any time you come to London--"

"I may be coming this summer."

"Then I think I can be of use to you there. Shall we go?"

This time Doctor Hartley did move. A weight seemed lifted from his shoulders, and he went, almost with alacrity, towards the boat.

"After all, you are much my senior," he said, as they were getting in, "besides being an intimate friend of the patient. I don't think it would seem unnatural to any one."

"The most natural thing in the world!" said Isaacson, calmly. "Yes, Ha.s.san, you can come with us. Come in the other boat. I may want you to do something for me later on."

The two doctors did not talk much as they were rowed towards the _Loulia_. Both were preoccupied. As they drew near to her, however, Doctor Hartley began to fidget. His bodily restlessness betrayed his mental uneasiness.

"I do hope she'll be reasonable," he said at length.

"I think she will."

"What makes you?"

"She's a decidedly clever woman."

"Clever--oh, yes, she is. She was very well known, wasn't she, once--in a certain way?"

"As a beauty--yes."

Isaacson's tone of voice was scarcely encouraging, and the other relapsed into silence and continued to fidget. But when they were close to the _Loulia_, almost under the blue light that shone at her mast-head, he said, in a low and secretive voice:

"I think you had better take the lead, as you are my senior. It will appear more natural."

"Very well. But I don't want to seem to--"

"No, no! Don't mind about me! I shall perfectly understand. I have chosen to call you in. That shows I am not satisfied with the way the case is going."

The felucca touched the side of the _Loulia_. Ibrahim appeared. He smiled when he saw them, smiled still more when he perceived beyond them the second boat with Ha.s.san. Isaacson stepped on board first. Hartley followed him without much alacrity.

"I want to see Mrs. Armine," Isaacson said to Ibrahim. Ibrahim went towards the steps.

"Do you happen to know what that Arabic writing means?" Isaacson asked of Hartley, as they were about to pa.s.s under the motto of the _Loulia_.

"That--yes; I asked. It's from the Koran."

"Yes?"

"It means--the fate of every man have we bound about his neck."

"Ah! Rather fatalistic! Does it appeal to you?"

"I don't know. I haven't thought about it. I wonder how she'll receive us!"

"It will be all right," Isaacson said with cheerful confidence.

But he was wondering too.

The first saloon was empty. Ibrahim left them in it, and went through the doorway beyond to the after part of the vessel. Isaacson sat down on the divan, but Hartley moved about. His present anxiety was in proportion to his past admiration of Mrs. Armine. He had adored her enough once to be very much afraid of her now.

"I do--I must say I hope she won't make a scene," he said.

"Oh, no."

"Yes, but you didn't see her this afternoon."

"She was upset. Some people can't endure daytime sleep. She's had time now to recover."

But Hartley did not seem to be rea.s.sured. He kept looking furtively towards the door by which Ibrahim had vanished. In about five minutes it was opened again by Ibrahim. He stood aside, slightly bending and looking on the floor, and Mrs. Armine came in, dressed in a sort of elaborate tea-gown, grey in colour, with silver embroideries. She was carefully made up, but not made up pale. Her cheeks were delicately flushed with colour. Her lips were red. Her shining hair was arranged to show the beautiful shape of her head as clearly as possible and to leave her lovely neck quite bare. Everything that could be done to render her attractive had been very deftly done. Nevertheless, even Isaacson, who had seen the change in her that afternoon, and had been prepared for further change in her by Hartley, was surprised by the alteration a few hours had made in her appearance.

Middle-age, with its subtle indications of what old age will be, had laid its hands upon her, had suddenly and firmly grasped her. As before, since she had been in Egypt, she had appeared to most people very much younger than she really was, so now she appeared older, decisively older, than she actually was. When Isaacson had looked at her in his consulting-room he had thought her not young, nor old, nor definitely middle-aged. Now he realized exactly what she would be some day as a painted and powdered old woman, striving by means of clever corsets, a perfect wig, and an ingenious complexion to simulate that least artificial of all things, youth. The outlines of the face were sharper, cruder than before; the nose and chin looked more pointed, the cheek-bones much more salient. The mouth seemed to have suddenly "given in" to the thing it had hitherto successfully striven against. And the eyes burnt with a fire that called the attention to the dark night slowly but certainly coming to close about this woman, and to withdraw her beauty into its blackness.

Isaacson's thought was: "What must be the state of the mind which has thus suddenly triumphed over a hitherto triumphant body?" And he felt like a man who looks down into a gulf, and who sees nothing, but hears movements and murmurs of horror and despair.

Mrs. Armine came straight to Isaacson. Her eyes, fastened upon him, seemed to defy him to see the change in her. She smiled and said:

"So you've come again! It's very good of you. Nigel is awake now."

She looked towards Doctor Hartley.

"I hope Doctor Isaacson will be able to rea.s.sure you," she said. "You frightened me this afternoon. I don't think you quite realized what it is to a woman to have sprung upon her so abruptly such an alarming view of an invalid's condition."

"But I didn't at all mean--" began the young doctor in agitation.

"I don't know what you meant," she interrupted, "but you alarmed me dreadfully. Well, are you going to see my husband together?"

"Yes, we must do that," said Isaacson.

He was slightly surprised by her total lack of all further opposition to the consultation, although he had almost prophesied it to Hartley.

Perhaps he had prophesied to rea.s.sure himself, for now he was conscious of a certain rather vague sense of doubt and of uneasiness, such as comes upon a man who, without actually suspecting an ambush, wonders whether, perhaps, he is near one.

"I dare say you would rather I was not present at your consultation?"

said Mrs. Armine.

"It isn't usual for any one to be present except the doctors taking part in it," said Isaacson.

"The consultation comes after the visit to the patient," she said; "and of course I'll leave you alone for that. I should prefer to leave you alone while you are examining my husband, too, but I'm sorry to say he insists on my being there."

Isaacson was no longer in doubt about an ambush. She had prepared one while she had been left alone with the sick man. Hartley having unexpectedly escaped from the magic circle of her influence, she had devoted herself to making it invulnerable about her husband.

Nevertheless, he meant to break in at whatever cost.