The Heart of a Woman Part 21

"Good night, my boy. How will you get back?"

"Oh, a taxi is the quickest. Edie might have heard something, and be anxious. I must hurry home now."

Louisa was standing in the hall at the top of the steps. Luke raised his hat to her and having shaken hands with Colonel Harris quietly turned to go, and was soon lost in the gloom beyond.

No one who had been standing in the lobby of the hotel would have guessed that these three people who had talked and bowed and shaken hands so quietly were facing one of life's most appalling, most overwhelming tragedies.

The world's puppets had been strung up again, because indifferent eyes were there to watch and gape, and in the presence of these modern Bulls of Bashan the puppets danced to the prevalent tune.

CHAPTER XVII

AND WHAT OF THE SECRET?

When Luke arrived at his uncle's house early the next morning, he was met in the hall by Doctor Newington, who was descending the stairs and who gravely beckoned to the young man to follow him into the library.

"They called me in last night," he said in reply to Luke's quick and anxious query. "The butler--or whatever he may be--told me that he was busy fastening up the front door preparatory to going to bed when he heard a heavy thud proceeding from the library. He found his master lying full length on the floor: the head had come in violent contact, as he fell, with the corner of this table; blood was trickling from a scalp wound, and Lord Radclyffe himself was apparently in a swoon. The man is a regular coward and a fool besides. He left his master lying just as he had fallen, but fortunately he knew me and knew where to find me, and within ten minutes I was on the spot, and had got Lord Radclyffe into bed."

"Is it," asked Luke, "anything serious?"

"Lord Radclyffe has not been over strong lately. He has had a great deal to put up with, and at his age the system is not sufficiently elastic or--how shall I put it?--sufficiently recuperative to stand either constant nerve strain or nagging worries."

"I don't know," interposed Luke stiffly, "that my uncle has had either nerve strain or worry to put up with."

"Oh," rejoined the doctor, whose gruff familiarity seemed to Luke's sensitive ear to be tainted with the least possible note of impertinence, "I am an old friend of your uncle, you know, and of all your family; there isn't much that has escaped my observation during the past year."

"You have not yet told me, doctor," said Luke, a shade more stiffly than before, "what is the matter with Lord Radclyffe."

There was distinct emphasis on the last two words.

Doctor Newington shrugged his shoulders good-humouredly.

"Your uncle has had something in the nature of a stroke," he said bluntly, and he fixed keen light-coloured eyes on those of Luke, watching the effect which the news--baldly and crudely put--would have on the young man's nerves. He was a man with what is known as a fashionable practice. He lived in Hertford Street and his rounds were encircled by the same boundaries as those of the rest of Mayfair. He had had plenty of opportunity of studying those men and women who compose the upper grades of English society. They and their perfect _sang-froid_, their well-drilled calm under the most dire calamities, or most unexpected blows had often caused him astonishment when he was a younger man, fresh from hospital work, and from the haunts of humbler folk, who had no cause or desire to hide the depth of their feelings. Now he was used to his fashionable patients and had ceased to wonder, and Luke's impa.s.siveness on hearing of his uncle's sudden illness did not necessarily strike him as indifference.

"Is it serious?" asked Luke.

"Serious. Of course," a.s.sented the doctor.

"Do you mean that Lord Radclyffe's life is in danger?"

"At sixty years of age, life is always in danger."

"I don't mean that," rejoined Luke with a slight show of impatience.

"Is Lord Radclyffe in immediate danger?"

"No. With great care and constant nursing, he may soon rally, though I doubt if he will ever be as strong and hearty as he was this time last year."

"Then what about a nurse?"

"I'll send one down to-day, but----"

"Yes?"

"Lord Radclyffe's present household is--well, hardly adequate to the exigencies of a long and serious illness--he ought to have a day and a night nurse. I can send both, but they will want some waiting on and of course proper meals and ordinary comforts----"

"I can see to all that. Thank you for your advice."

"A good and reliable cook is also necessary--who understands invalid cooking--all that is most important."

"And shall be attended to at once. Is there anything else?"

"Perfect rest and quiet of course are the chief things."

"I shan't worry him, you may be sure, and no one else is likely to come near him."

"Except the police," remarked the doctor dryly.

"The police?"

The grave events of the night before, and those that were ready to follow one another in grim array for the next few days had almost fled from Luke's memory in face of the other--to him more serious--calamity--his uncle's illness.

"Oh! Ah, yes!" he said vaguely. "I had forgotten."

"The nurses," rejoined the doctor with a pompousness which somehow irritated Luke, "will have my authorization to forbid any one having access to Lord Radclyffe for the present. I will write out the certificate now, and this you can present to any one who may show a desire to exercise official authority in the matter of interviewing my patient."

"I daresay that I can do all that is necessary at the inquest and so on--Lord Radclyffe need not be worried."

"He mustn't be worried. To begin with he would not know any one, and he is wholly unable to answer questions."

"That settles the matter of course. So, if you will write the necessary certificate, I'll see the police authorities at once on the subject. Would Lord Radclyffe know me, do you think?" added the young man after a slight pause of hesitancy.

"Well," replied the doctor evasively, "I don't think I would worry him to-day. We'll see how he gets on."

"He'll probably ask for me."

"That is another matter, and if he does, you must of course see him.

But unless there is a marked improvement during the day, he won't ask for any one."

Luke was silent a moment or two while the doctor sat down at the writing table and sought for pen and ink.

"Very well," he said after awhile, "we'll leave it at that. Lord Radclyffe--I can promise you this--shall on no account be disturbed without permission from you. How soon will the nurse arrive?"

"Within the hour. The night nurse will come after tea."

Doctor Newington wrote out and signed the usual medical certificate to the effect that Lord Radclyffe's state of health demanded perfect quietude and rest and that he was unable to see any one or to answer any questions. He read his own writing through very carefully, then folded the paper in half and handed it to Luke.