The Shadow of a Sin Part 24

CHAPTER XXVI.

Dr. Chalmers was getting on in the world. His practice had at first been confined exclusively to the locality in which he lived; but of late n.o.ble ladies had sent for him, and his name was mentioned with great honor in the medical journals. He had been consulted in some very difficult cases, and people said he saved Lady Poldean's life when all the physicians had p.r.o.nounced her case hopeless. Honors were falling thick and fast upon him.

Lady Dartelle, of Hulme Abbey, was one of those who placed implicit faith in him. Her ladyship was credited with pa.s.sing through life with one eye firmly fixed on the "main chance." She never neglected an opportunity of saving a guinea; and she was wont to observe that she had much better advice from Dr. Chalmers for five guineas than she could procure from a fashionable physician for twenty. Her youngest daughter, Clara, had been ailing for some time, and Lady Dartelle decided on leaving Hulme Abbey and coming up to town for the benefit of the doctor's advice.

Lady Dartelle was a widow--"left," as she was accustomed to observe, emphatically, "with four dear children." The eldest, the son and heir, Sir Aubrey, was travelling on the Continent; her two daughters, Veronica and Mildred, were accomplished young ladies who had taken every worldly maxim to heart, and never bestowed a thought upon anything save of the most frivolous nature.

They had made their _debut_ some years before, but it had not been a very successful one. The young ladies were only moderately good looking, and they had not the most amiable of tempers. Perhaps this latter fact might account in some degree for several matrimonial failures. The young ladies had not accompanied Lady Dartelle to town--they objected to be seen there out of season--so that her ladyship had the whole of the mansion to herself.

Dr. Chalmers had one day been sitting for some time by the child, examining her, talking to her and asking her innumerable questions. She was a fair, fragile, pretty child, with great earnest eyes and sensitive lips. The doctor's heart warmed to her; and when Lady Dartelle sent to request his presence in her room, he looked very anxious.

"I want you to tell me the truth, doctor," she said. "The child has never been very well nor very ill. I want to know if you think she is in any danger."

"I cannot tell," he replied. "It seems to me that the child's chances are equal for life or death."

"I may not send her to school, then?" she said; and a shade of annoyance pa.s.sed over the lady's face.

"Certainly not," was the prompt reply. "She will require the most constant and kindly home-care. She should have a kind and cheerful companion. I should not advise you entirely to forget her education, but it must not be forced."

"That is tantamount to saying that I must have a governess at home--and I do not see my way clear to that at all. Servants are bad enough; but the real plague of life are governesses. I have no idea where to find a suitable one. One's troubles seem to have no end."

To which remark the doctor wisely made no reply. Lady Dartelle looked up at him.

"You must see a great deal of the world, Dr. Chalmers. Can you tell me where I can find a trustworthy governess? I must have a gentlewoman, of course; yet she must not be one likely to thrust herself forward. That I could not endure. What is the matter, doctor?" she asked; for Dr.

Chalmers' face had suddenly flushed scarlet, and his eyes intimated something which my Lady Dartelle did not quite understand.

"I was thinking," he replied, "that I do know a young lady who would be all that you require."

"I am very glad," said Lady Dartelle, looking much relieved. "Who is she? What is her name?"

"She is a _protegee_ of my mother's--her name is Millicent Holte. She is highly educated, and most sweet-tempered--in fact, I do not think, if all England were searched, that any one so exactly suited for the position could be found. She is of gentle birth, and has a quiet, graceful manner that is very charming. There is only one objection."

"What is that?" asked Lady Dartelle, anxiously.

"She has never been a governess, and might not, perhaps, like the position--I cannot tell."

"She has never taught--of course that would make some difference in the stipend. I do not know that the deficiency need cause concern in respect of anything else. Where is the young lady now?"

"She is staying with my mother," said the doctor, his honest face flushing at the need of concealment.

"That is recommendation sufficient," vouchsafed Lady Dartelle, graciously. "I shall require no other. When will it be convenient for me to see her?"

"I dare say mother could call upon you to-morrow and bring Miss Holte with her."

"That would be very nice. Three o'clock would be a convenient time for me. Suppose Miss Holte should accept the engagement, would she be able, do you think, to return to Hulme Abbey with me at the end of the week?"

"I should imagine so. I do not know of anything to prevent it."

Yet as he spoke, that fair, sweet, sad face seemed to rise before him, and he wondered how he should bear his home when she was there no longer.

Still, he had done what she wanted. She had asked him to find her some work to do, and he had complied with her request. Yet his heart smote him as he thought of her--so fair, so fragile, so sensitive. How would she like to be among strangers? Fortunately he had no conception of the true life of a governess in a fashionable family; if he had had, it would have been the last work of the kind he would have chosen for her in whom he was interested.

"The work will brace her nerves; it will do her good," he said to himself; "and if by chance she does not like it, she need not stay--there will always be a home for her with us."

When he reached home he told her. She appeared neither pleased nor regretful; it seemed to him that the common events of every-day life no longer possessed the least interest for her. She asked no questions about either Lady Dartelle or her place of residence, or how many children she would have to teach. The young girl agreed with him that she would do well to accept the offer.

"Are you pleased?" he asked. "Do you think you will like the duties?"

"I am very thankful to have some work to do," she replied; "and I am deeply grateful to you, Dr. Chalmers."

"You may well be that. I have never made such a sacrifice in my life as that of letting you go, Millicent. I should not have done so but that I think it will be for your good. Your home is still here, and if you do not like Hulme Abbey, I will fetch you away at once."

That night when the unhappy girl was alone in her room, she threw up her arms with a despairing cry. "How many years have I to live? How many years can I bear this, and live? Oh! Adrian, Adrian, if I could only look once upon your face and die! Oh, my love, my love, how am I to live and never see your face again?"

CHAPTER XXVII.

"There is one thing we are quite forgetting," said Dr. Chalmers, "although we call ourselves such clever people."

He pointed as he spoke to the little rings of golden hair, soft, fine as silk, light as gold in color, like the small tendrils of a vine in shape. She raised her beautiful, blushing face to his.

"You did it," she said, half-reproachfully. "I look just like a boy.

What shall I do?"

The doctor touched one of the soft golden rings with his finger. "This is anything but the conventional governess style; Millicent should have plain, Madonna-like braids of a dull gray tint--should she not, mother?"

"I do not like your plan at all, Robert," said Mrs. Chalmers, looking at her sweet, sad face. "I do not see why Millicent cannot be happy with us, nor why she can not recover her strength here. I suppose you know best. One thing is certain; she cannot leave us thus. Should you like, my dear, to wear hair that was not your own?"

"No, I should not like it at all," she replied, her face flushing.

The doctor laughed aloud.

"You will never make a woman of fashion, Millicent, as far as I understand such beings. A lady with a magnificent head of hair of her own carefully puts it out of sight and covers it with some one else's hair. I think the fashion most hateful, but my opinion of course matters little. Seriously speaking, Millicent, my mother must take you to a hair-dresser's, as something must be done; this beautiful, graceful, infantile head would never suit her ladyship."

Much against Millicent's will a hair-dresser was taken into their confidence.

"Could I not wear a cap?" asked Millicent, looking shyly at the magnificent coiffures of all colors.

"It would be very unbecoming," said the hair-dresser.

"A governess in a cap!" spoke Mrs. Chalmers. "No, that will not do at all."

"What does it matter?" thought the girl. "After all, my appearance will really interest no one."