One Maid's Mischief Part 68

He walked slowly homeward and entered the snug cottage-like place, which was the very pattern of primness, and day by day grew more like to the place where he had first set eyes upon his wife.

"Seems precious dull without the little woman," he muttered; "but I suppose I mustn't grumble as she's away to do good to others."

He thrust his hands into his pockets, and walked up and down the room.

"Dear, dear me," he said, impatiently; "a man, especially a doctor, can't go on bemoaning people for ever. Where would science be if he did? Of course I'm very sorry about poor old Arthur, though after all perhaps he'll turn up all right, with his vasculum full of new orchids.

Here's time galloping away, weeks and months and years, and I never get a bit nearer to the solution of my problem. Here am I, as I may say, right upon the very spot, and yet I do nothing whatever to prove that this is the place to which King Solomon sent to find his gold, and apes, and peac.o.c.ks."

Dr Bolter took off his sun-hat, and rubbed his bald head in a peculiarly vicious way, and then went on debating the question so as to work himself up to the carrying out of the project which he had in view.

"Here's the case," he said. "My wife's out; there's n.o.body ill, for I've polished off all that needs doing this morning, so when could there be a better chance? I'll go, that I will."

But there came up, as if to oppose him, the recollection of the morning after Mr Perowne's party, and he was obliged to ask himself how could he go now?

"I don't care," he cried, angrily. "I have done all I could, and thought of all I could, and I can do no more. Here's my wife out nearly always now, so that she would not miss me, so I ought to go. I might discover that this is the real site of Solomon's gold mines, and if so-- Phew, what a paper to read at the Royal Geographical!

"I'll go! My mind's made up. I'll go, that I will," he exclaimed; "and somehow I seem to fancy that this time I shall make my great discovery.

Hah! yes; what a discovery! And that paper read before the Royal Society--a paper on the discovery of the Ancient Ophir, by Dr Bolter, F.R.S. Why, my name--our name I should say, for Mary's sake--would be handed down to posterity."

Here the doctor gave his head another rub, as if to get rid of a tiresome fly.

"I don't know about posterity," he muttered. "It wouldn't matter to me, as I've no youngsters. Still it would be a fine discovery to make.

But--"

Here he had another vicious rub.

"Suppose in the meantime Helen Perowne and the rest of the party come back!"

VOLUME TWO, CHAPTER NINETEEN.

DR BOLTER TAKES A HOLIDAY.

That question of the possibility of Helen Perowne coming back interfered a good deal with Doctor Bolter's project--one which he had been longing to put in force for months and months--a project which his journey to England and his marriage had set aside, though it was never forgotten.

"Suppose Helen comes back?" he asked himself often.

"Well, I ought to be here," he said; "but if she were to return in my absence she couldn't help being pleased, for I might have discovered the gold mines. But ought I to tell Mary where I am going?"

"No," he said, decidedly; "she would object. She might agree to my going upon a collecting expedition; but she would say as she said before, that the Ophir question was a myth."

Somehow the more Dr Bolter tried to make up his mind to go, the more undecided he grew. He wanted to make an expedition into the interior very badly, but the hidden influence of that very decided little woman his wife was there still, making him feel guilty and like a child who tries to conceal some fault; and somehow, the more he tried to shake off the sensation, the worse he felt.--"There, it's no use," he cried at last, angrily. "No sooner does a man marry than farewell to independence. They say a man and his wife become one flesh, and really I think it's a fact, for the man is completely absorbed and it's all wife. The man becomes n.o.body at all."

The doctor went into his own room, half museum, half surgery, and in a listless, pettish way he began to pull out drawer after drawer of specimens, some of which required examination badly, for the ants were beginning an attack, and this necessitated the introduction of a pungent acid which these busy little insects did not like.

"I might find gold in abundance," said the doctor, as he busied himself over his specimens. "I might make such discoveries as would cause my name to be famous for ever, and here am I tied as it were by one unfortunate step to my wife's ap.r.o.n. Hah! I was a great idiot to sacrifice my liberty.

"Not I," he added, sharply. "Not I. She is a bit of a tyrant with me, and she's as jealous as Oth.e.l.lo, but she is an uncommonly nice little woman, and bless her, she thinks I'm about the cleverest fellow under the sun.

"Well, there's not much to grumble at there," he said, decidedly, as he smiled and settled his chin in his collar. "I don't see that I need mind her being a bit jealous of me. It shows how fond she is, and she must be very proud of me if she thinks like that."

This idea gave the little doctor so much satisfaction that for the moment he determined to go up to Perowne's and ask his wife for leave of absence for a few days.

"N-no! It wouldn't do," he muttered, shaking his head dolefully. "She would not let me go. I shall have to make a bold dash for it if I do mean to have a run, and face the consequences afterwards.

"Look here, you know," he cried gazing round at his specimens; "it's about pitiful, that's what it is, and I might just as well give up collecting altogether. Such an invitation from the Inche Maida as I had, to make her place my home, and start from there upon my investigations, only that stupid jealous idea on the part of my wife stopped it! Bah! It is intolerable."

He thrust in a drawer in a most vicious manner; but Doctor Bolter's annoyance with his wife came and went like an April shower. On re-opening the drawer he proceeded to arrange the specimens that his petulant fit had disturbed.

"I shall have to give it up," he said, sadly. "So I may as well make the best of it, and--Hooray!"

Doctor Bolter slapped one of his legs vigorously, as if he were killing a fly, and a sunshiny look of pleasure spread all over his face.

"To be sure! The very idea! I'll carry it out too--just a little--so as to be quite square with her; and who knows but what I might pick up some news of them after all. Why didn't I think of this before?

"Let me see," he continued, thoughtfully, "how shall I manage it? What shall I do? I know. I'll run right up the river--ten miles or so beyond the Inche Maida's--and then strike into one of the supplementary streams, and make straight for the mountains.

"That will be capital!" he cried, rubbing his hands. "Who knows but what I may hit upon some one or other of the old gold-workings; find ancient implements--proofs perhaps that Solomon's ships sailed up this very river. The idea is grand, sir, and I'll be off at once!"

The idea was so "grand, sir," that in that hot climate it put the little doctor in a profuse perspiration, and he walked up and down the room, handkerchief in hand, dabbing his face and head.

"Yes," he cried eagerly, "I may find out something about Helen Perowne and our other friends. I've got a good excuse for going now, and go I will!"

He stood thinking for a few minutes; and then, adjusting his puggree so as to give plenty of shelter to the back of his head, he walked down to the river-side, and one of the Malay boatmen paddled him in his sampan across to the Residency island, where he stepped out and walked up to Mr Harley's official room, to find that gentleman looking older and more careworn than was his wont.

"Well, doctor, what news?" he said, anxiously. "Anything wrong?"

"No; nothing fresh."

"No fever or cholera to add to one's trouble, eh?"

"Nothing at all," was the reply. "No, sir, I can present you with a clean bill of health."

"Then why have you come? Not for nothing, doctor," said the Resident sharply.

"Here, I say," cried the little doctor, "don't be so horribly inhospitable when a man comes to see you?"

"Inhospitable? Nonsense! You have not come across here to find hospitality. Now, doctor, speak out. What is it? Do you know anything?"

"Plainly, no. But the fact is," said the visitor, clearing his throat, "I am not busy now; Mrs Bolter is a good deal away from home, so I thought this would be a favourable opportunity for taking a boat and a man or two, and going up the river to explore a few of the side streams so as to try and find Helen Perowne."

"Rubbish!" said the Resident, sharply.

"Eh?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the doctor, who was taken aback by the Resident's quick, unceremonious way of speaking.

"I said Rubbish, Bolter, and I now say Humbug, man! Do you think I do not know better than that?"

"My dear Harley!" exclaimed the little doctor, indignantly.