Tales of the Wonder Club Volume II Part 5

"Oh, aunt!" I heard Molly say as she came up, "here is Dr. Crow, the gentleman that I spoke to you about yesterday."

"Ah, Miss Sykes!" said I, lifting my hat in the most polite manner, "I hope I see you well this morning."

Molly gave me her hand, and introduced me to her aunt, who curtseyed and smiled.

I said that I had come down here for a change of air, and that I was amusing myself with botanising.

"Oh, indeed!" said the aunt. "So that is your hobby, is it, Dr.

Crow--well, and a very delightful one, too. I am very fond of flowers myself, and only wish I knew more about them. I do envy you scientific men. You always seem so happy and contented."

"Well, madam," said I, "there is nothing like having a hobby in life. It fills up many a weary hour and makes us forget the din and the bustle of the busy world around us. For my part, when I have no patients to attend to, I am always occupied in some way or other."

"Dear me," said the aunt. "How very delightful!"

We walked on together, conversing agreeably as we went, and afterwards I was invited into the house. Need I say that I praised to the utmost the good taste of everything I saw there, her paperhangings, her worsted work, her crochet, etc. I was then shown some specimens of ferns and wild flowers that she had dried in a book, and she begged of me to write their cla.s.sical names under them.

This was indeed a trial, as I had never learnt a single word of Latin, but it would not do to back out, so I exerted all my ingenuity to invent some crackjaw names. Among the rest I remember inscribing the words "_Rodus sidus_," "_Stenchius obnoxious_," and "_Herbus unnonus_." These names delighted Molly's aunt immensely, who believed she was already a Latin scholar. I found my way so well into the aunt's good graces that I was invited to call whenever I liked, and frequently asked to dinner.

As I did not like to call every day, for fear it should look bad, either Molly or Molly's aunt managed to feel unwell on the days that I did not call, and they found it necessary to send for me, so it came to much the same thing, as I saw Molly every day. Molly's aunt was one of that cla.s.s of females who are always imagining that something or other is the matter with them. I soon saw, therefore, that to get thoroughly into her good graces, I must humour her in her whims.

Accordingly, I made out that she had this, that, or the other--indeed, I forget what it was exactly that I said ailed her--and promised to bring her some physic. This quite won her heart, so I at once set about making some liquorice water, endeavouring to disguise the taste of the liquorice as much as possible by adding salt, pepper, a little soap, some tobacco, and other nauseous ingredients. I wonder the mess didn't poison her, but so far from causing ill-effects, she informed me that it had really done her good.

Whether the good it had done her only lay in her imagination or whether the strange compound really did possess a medicinal property I cannot tell (I can hardly think the latter), but certain it was, she _did_ seem better. I believe the real fact of the matter to be this. Molly's aunt was the daughter of a well-to-do retired butcher, and like many of her cla.s.s, had over-indulged in high feeding, and consequently was always suffering from overloaded stomach. The mess that I gave her made her sick, and that, in reality, and not merely in imagination, effected a cure.

I then put her on a lower diet, recommended her plenty of walking exercise, and in a very short time there was a complete change in her const.i.tution. She no longer felt dyspeptic and desponding, suffered no longer from nervous headaches, in fact, in her own words, she "felt quite a girl again." All the effect of my wonderful medicine. This, of course, was a feather in my cap, and she looked up to me more than ever.

A week and then a fortnight pa.s.sed away, and I now thought it high time to break to the aunt my love affair with her niece, and ask her consent to our union. So I called upon her one morning and requested to speak with her alone. She received me in the back parlour, and begged me to take a seat. I did so, and began thus:--

"Ahem! Madam, I wished to talk to you upon a matter of some delicacy."

"Good gracious, doctor! What can have happened?" she exclaimed, observing a look of unwonted gravity in my face.

"Oh, nothing, nothing," I said; "at least, nothing of any great importance. Hear me. I am a physician of a certain age and in very good practice." I paused.

"Well, Dr. Crow," said the aunt.

"And I am still a bachelor," I continued.

"Well, sir," said she, wriggling about in her seat and looking coy, as if she guessed I meditated a proposal, and took the compliment to herself.

"Well, madam," said I, impatient to get through this painful duty, "to cut a long story short, I am in love with your charming niece."

"_Oh!_ doctor," she exclaimed.

The "_Oh!_" was jerked out with a spasm truly painful, and her countenance fell visibly.

"I dare say you were not prepared for such a surprise, but I have known Miss Sykes now a long time, and I never saw anyone who could suit me better as a wife. Miss Sykes and I have talked the matter over together, and she only awaits her aunt's consent. Thank you, thank you, madam," said I seizing her hand, "I knew you would give it," before giving her an opportunity either to consent or refuse.

"Molly!" I cried, "come and thank your kind aunt for having given her consent to our happy union."

Molly entered, blushing and giggling.

"Come, Molly," said I, "come and thank aunt, for now we shall be as happy as two birds in a nest. I'll go and see about the licence, and we'll get married as soon as ever we can."

I laughed and appeared very merry, repeatedly seizing the aunt by the hand and patting her on the shoulder before she had time to get a word out.

"Stay, sir," said she, at length, "I can do nothing without the consent of my niece's father."

"Oh, that will be easily obtained, I am quite sure," said I, hopefully.

"We will at once write a note, and all will be settled."

I brought her her desk, opened it, took out pen, ink, and paper, and placing a chair for her, induced her to write.

"Yes," I said, looking over her shoulder as she wrote, "that will do--not _too_ cold. Say I am in a position to make his daughter comfortable, and that you think it is a very desirable match--yes, that's the sort of thing. Give it to me, I'll take it to the post." So saying, I s.n.a.t.c.hed up the epistle, bounded from the house, and returned shortly, as happy as if everything were already settled.

In due time came a reply from old Sykes, to the purport that, though he would have chosen a younger man for his daughter, yet on the whole, considering that I had a pretty good business as a doctor, and could keep her well, he saw no reason why he should withhold his consent.

Furthermore, he begged the aunt that if his daughter were to be married to hasten the marriage as much as possible, as young Rashly had been missing for some time, and folks said that he was down at H---- after her.

"Bravo! old Sykes," said I to myself, "Fortune seems to favour me indeed."

The next step that I intended to take was to obtain the consent of my father. Accordingly, I took leave of Molly for a time, stating that I had to absent myself on business, and promising a speedy return. I entered the stage and arrived at our village, where I put up at my father's inn. It was towards evening when I arrived.

"Landlord!" I cried, disguising my voice, "I wish to dine in half-an-hour."

"Yes, sir," said my father, coming towards me, bowing, and rubbing his hands.

"Have you got a good bed?" asked I, "for I wish to sleep here to-night."

"Yes, sir, capital beds, sir," said my father, "both clean and well aired."

"Very well, then, make me up one," said I, pompously.

"It shall be done, sir," said my father, obsequiously.

I occupied myself with reading until dinner-time. At length the dinner came up.

"A pint of your best port, landlord," I cried, magnificently.

My father returned with the port, crusted and cob-webbed, from the cellar, and I began my dinner. Having finished, I filled my pipe, and whilst my father cleared the table, I deigned to enter into conversation with him.

I began by asking him the number of inhabitants in the village, and then brought him out upon the subject of the epidemic.

"Ah! sir," said my father, deeply moved, "it carried off my only son some three weeks ago, and a finer lad you wouldn't see in all England. I hoped that he would have been the prop of my old age, but he was carried off, sir, along with the rest--struck down in the very spring of his youth, as you may say. Only nineteen was my poor boy when he was taken from me," and my father's eyes moistened as he spoke.

"Only nineteen!" I exclaimed. "Was he not strong?"

"Strong, sir! I believe you--strong as a lion," said my father.

"Dear me!" I said, "it is very strange that his youth and strength did not resist the malady."