Deadham Hard Part 51

That her complexion matched her shirt in colour--or rather in all absence of it--that her face was thin, its contours hardened, her eyebrows drawn into a little frown, her eyes enormous, sombre and clouded as with meditative thought, increased, in Carteret's estimation, a.s.surance of her regained self-mastery and composure. Nor did a reticence in her manner displease him.

"I have persuaded Aunt Felicia to breakfast upstairs," she told him. "Dr.

McCabe sends me word he--my father--wishes to rest for the present, so I engaged Aunt Felicia to rest too. She was wonderful."

Damaris' voice shook slightly, as did her hand lifting the coffee-pot.

"She stayed up all night. So did you, I'm afraid, didn't you, Colonel Sahib?"

"Oh, for me that was nothing. A bath, a change, and ten minutes out there on the battery watching the sun come up over the sea," Carteret said. "So don't waste compa.s.sion on me. I'm as fit as a fiddle and in no wise deserve it."

"Ah! but you and Aunt Felicia did stay," she repeated, her hands still rather tremulously busy with coffee-pot and milk jug. "You were faithful and I no better than a shirker. I fell through, miserably lost myself, which was selfish, contemptible. I am ashamed. Only I was so startled. I never really knew before such--such things could be.--Forgive me, Colonel Sahib. I have been to Aunt Felicia and asked her forgiveness already.--And don't think too meanly of me, please. The shirking is over and done with for always. You may trust me it never will happen again--my losing myself as I did last night, I mean."

In making this appeal for leniency, her eyes met Carteret's fairly for the first time; and he read in them, not without admiration and a twinge of pain, both the height of her new-born, determined valour and the depth of her established distress.

"You needn't tell me that, you needn't tell me that, dear witch," he answered quickly. "I was sure of it all along. I knew it was just a phase which would have no second edition. So put any question of shame or need of forgiveness out of your precious head. You were rushed up against circ.u.mstances, against a revelation, calculated to stagger the most seasoned campaigner. You did not shirk; but it took you a little time to get your bearings. That was all. Don't vex your sweet soul with quite superfluous reproaches.--Sugar? Yes, and plenty of it I am afraid.--But you, too, must eat."

And on her making some show of repugnance--

"See here, we can't afford to despise the day of small things, of minor aids to efficiency, dearest witch," he wisely admonished her.

Whereupon, emulous to please him, bending her will to his, Damaris humbled herself to consumption of a portion of the contents of the chafing-dishes aforesaid. To discover that, granted a healthy subject, sorrow queerly breeds hunger, the initial distaste for food--in the main a sentimental one--once surmounted.

Later McCabe joined them. Recognized Damaris' att.i.tude of valour, and inwardly applauded it, although himself in woeful state. For he was hard hit, badly upset. Conscious of waste of tissue, he set about to restore it without apology or hesitation, trouble putting an edge to appet.i.te in his case also, and that of formidable keenness. Bitterly he grieved, since bearing the patient, he feared very certainly to lose, an uncommon affection. He loved Charles Verity; while, from the worldly standpoint, his dealings with The Hard meant very much to him--made for glory, a feather in his cap visible to all and envied by many. Minus the fine flourish of it his position sank to obscurity. As a whist-playing, golf-playing, club-haunting, Anglo-Indian ex-civil surgeon--and Irishman at that--living in lodgings at Stourmouth, he commanded meagre consideration. But as chosen medical-attendant and, in some sort, retainer of Sir Charles Verity he ranked. The county came within his purview. Thanks to this connection with The Hard he, on occasion, rubbed shoulders with the locally great. Hence genuine grief for his friend was black-bordered by the prospect of impending social and mundane loss. The future frowned on him, view it in what terms he might. To use his own unspoken phrase, he felt "in h.e.l.lishly low water."

One point in particular just now worried him. Thus, as fish, eggs, porridge, hot cakes, honey, and jam disappeared in succession, he opened himself to Damaris and Carteret. A difficult subject, namely that of a second opinion.--Let no thought of any wounding of his susceptibilities operate against the calling in of such. He was ready and willing to meet any fellow pract.i.tioner they might select--a Harley Street big-wig, or Dr. Maskall, of Harchester, whose advice in respect of cardiac trouble was wide sought.

He had, however, but just launched the question when Hordle entered and, walking to the head of the table, addressed Damaris.

"Sir Charles desires me to say he will be glad to see you, miss, when you are at liberty," he told her in m.u.f.fled accents.

She sprang up, to pause an instant, irresolute, glancing wide-eyed at Carteret.

He had risen too. Coming round the corner of the table, he drew back her chair, put his hand under her elbow, went with her to the door.

"There is nothing to dread, dearest witch," he gently and quietly said.

"Have confidence in yourself. G.o.d keep you--and him.--Now you are quite ready? That's right.--Well, then go."

Carteret waited, looking after her until, crossing the hall followed by Hordle, she pa.s.sed along the corridor out of sight. Silent, preoccupied, he closed the door and took a turn the length of the room before resuming his place at the opposite side of the table to McCabe, facing the light.

The doctor, who had ceased eating and half risen to his feet at the commencement of this little scene, watched it throughout; at first indifferent, a prey to his own worries, but soon in quickening interest, shrewd enquiry and finally in dawning comprehension.

"Holy Mother of Mercy, so that's the lay of the land, is it?" and his loose lips shaped themselves to a whistle, yet emitted no sound. To obliterate all signs of which tendency to vulgar expression of enlightenment he rubbed moustache, mouth and chin with his napkin, studying Carteret closely meanwhile.

"In the pink of condition, by Gad--good for a liberal twenty years yet, and more--bar accident. Indefinite postponement of the grand climacteric in this case.--All the same a leetle, lee-tie bit dangerous, I'm thinking, for both, if she tumbles to it."

Then aloud--"Has the poor darling girl grasped the meaning of her father's illness do you make out, Colonel grasped the ugly eventualities of it?"

Carteret slowly brought his glance to bear on the speaker.

"I believe so, though she has not actually told me as much," he said--"And now about this question of a second opinion, McCabe?"

The easily huffed Irishman accepted the reproof in the best spirit possible, as confirming his own perspicacity.

"Quite so. Flicked him neatly on the raw, and he winced. All the same he's a white man, a real jewel of a fellow, worthy of good fortune if the ball's thrown his way. I wonder how long, by-the-by, this handsome game's been a-playing?"

With which, as requested, he returned to the rival claims of Harley Street and Harchester in respect of a consulting physician.

Carteret proved a faithful prophet, for in truth there was nothing to dread the beloved presence once entered, as Damaris thankfully registered.

The sun by now topped the hollies and shone into the study, flinging a bright slanting pathway across the dim crimson, scarlet and blue of the Turkey carpet. Charles Verity stood, in an open bay of the great window, looking out over the garden. Seen thus, in the still sunlight, the tall grey-clad figure possessed all its accustomed, slightly arrogant repose.

Damaris thrilled with exalted hope. For the young are slow to admit even the verdict of fact as final. His att.i.tude was so natural, so unstrained and unstudied, that the message of ghostly warning yesterday evening was surely discounted; while the subsequent terror of the night, that hideous battle with pain and suffocation, became to her incredible, an evil dream from which, in grateful ecstasy, she now awoke.

Her joy found expression.

"Dearest, dearest, you sent for me.--Is it to let me see you are really better, more beautifully recovered than they told me or I ventured to suppose?"

Her voice broke under a gladness midway between tears and laughter.

"The envious blades of Atropos' scissors have not cut the mortal thread yet anyhow," he answered, smiling, permitting himself the cla.s.sic conceit as a screen to possible emotion. "But we won't build too much on the clemency of Fate. How long she proposes to wait before closing her scissors it is idle to attempt to say."

He laid his hands on Damaris' shoulders. Bent his head and kissed her upward pouted lips--thereby hushing the loving disclaimer which rose to them.

"So we will keep on the safe side of the event, my wise child," he continued. "Make all our preparations and thus deny the enemy any satisfaction of taking us unawares.--Can you write a business letter for me?"

"A dozen, dearest, if you wish," Damaris a.s.sented eagerly. Yet that image of the scissors stayed by her. Already her joy was sensibly upon the wane.

"Oh! one will be sufficient, I think--quite sufficient for this morning."

Charles Verity turned his head, looking seaward through the tranquil sunshine.

"That Indian appointment has to be suitably thanked for and--declined."

Damaris drew back a step so as to gain a clearer view of him. The hands resting on her shoulders were oddly inert, so she fancied, forceless and in temperature cold. Even through the thickness of cloth jacket and silk shirt she was aware of their lifelessness and chill.

This roused rebellion in her. Her instinct was for fight. She made a return on McCabe's suggestion regarding further advice. She would demand a consultation, call in expert opinion. The dear man with the blue eyes--here her white face flushed rosy--would manage all that for her, and compel help in the form of the last word of medical science and skill.

"Might not your letter be put off for just a few days?" she pleaded, "in case--until"--

But Charles Verity broke in before she could finish her tender protest, a sadness, even hint of bitterness in his tone.

"You covet this thing so much," he said. "Your heart is so set on it?"

She made haste to rea.s.sure him.--No, no not that way, not for her. How could it signify, save on his account? She only cared because greedy of his advancement, greedy to have him exalted--placed where he belonged, on the summit, the apex, so that all must perceive and acknowledge his greatness. As to herself--and the flush deepened, making her in aspect deliciously youthful and ingenious--she confessed misgivings. Reported her talk with Carteret concerning the subject, and the scolding received from him thereupon.

"One more reason for writing in the sense I propose, then," her father declared, "since it sets your over-modest doubts and qualms at rest, my dear. That is settled."

His hands weighed on her shoulders as though he suddenly needed and sought support.

"I will sit down," he said. "There are other matters to be discussed, and I can, perhaps, talk more easily so."