Wives and Daughters Part 57

"Yes! he will have to run many risks, and go into many dangers, and will come back no nearer to the power of maintaining a wife than when he went out."

"I don't know that," she replied, still in the arch manner of one possessing superior knowledge. "A little bird did tell me that Osborne's life is not so very secure; and then--what will Roger be?

Heir to the estate."

"Who told you that about Osborne?" said he, facing round upon her, and frightening her with his sudden sternness of voice and manner.

It seemed as if absolute fire came out of his long dark sombre eyes.

"_Who_ told you, I say?"

She made a faint rally back into her former playfulness.

"Why? can you deny it? Is it not the truth?"

"I ask you again, Hyacinth, who told you that Osborne Hamley's life is in more danger than mine--or yours?"

"Oh, don't speak in that frightening way. My life is not in danger, I'm sure; nor yours either, love, I hope."

He gave an impatient movement, and knocked a wine-gla.s.s off the table. For the moment she felt grateful for the diversion, and busied herself in picking up the fragments: "bits of gla.s.s were so dangerous," she said. But she was startled by a voice of command, such as she had never yet heard from her husband.

"Never mind the gla.s.s. I ask you again, Hyacinth, who told you anything about Osborne Hamley's state of health?"

"I am sure I wish no harm to him, and I daresay he is in very good health, as you say," whispered she, at last.

"Who told--?" began he again, sterner than ever.

"Well, if you will know, and will make such a fuss about it," said she, driven to extremity, "it was you yourself--you or Dr. Nicholls, I am sure I forget which."

"I never spoke to you on the subject, and I don't believe Nicholls did. You'd better tell me at once what you're alluding to, for I'm resolved I'll have it out before we leave this room."

"I wish I'd never married again," she said, now fairly crying, and looking round the room, as if in vain search for a mouse-hole in which to hide herself. Then, as if the sight of the door into the store-room gave her courage, she turned and faced him.

"You should not talk your medical secrets so loud then, if you don't want people to hear them. I had to go into the store-room that day Dr. Nicholls was here; cook wanted a jar of preserve, and stopped me just as I was going out--I am sure it was for no pleasure of mine, for I was sadly afraid of stickying my gloves--it was all that you might have a comfortable dinner."

She looked as if she was going to cry again, but he gravely motioned her to go on, merely saying,--

"Well! you overheard our conversation, I suppose?"

"Not much," she answered eagerly, almost relieved by being thus helped out in her forced confession. "Only a sentence or two."

"What were they?" he asked.

"Why, you had just been saying something, and Dr. Nicholls said, 'If he has got aneurism of the aorta his days are numbered.'"

"Well. Anything more?"

"Yes; you said, 'I hope to G.o.d I may be mistaken; but there is a pretty clear indication of symptoms, in my opinion.'"

"How do you know we were speaking of Osborne Hamley?" he asked; perhaps in hopes of throwing her off the scent. But as soon as she perceived that he was descending to her level of subterfuge, she took courage, and said in quite a different tone to the cowed one which she had been using:

"Oh! I know. I heard his name mentioned by you both before I began to listen."

"Then you own you did listen?"

"Yes," said she, hesitating a little now.

"And pray how do you come to remember so exactly the name of the disease spoken of?"

"Because I went--now don't be angry, I really can't see any harm in what I did--"

"Then, don't deprecate anger. You went--"

"Into the surgery, and looked it out. Why might not I?"

Mr. Gibson did not answer--did not look at her. His face was very pale, and both forehead and lips were contracted. At length he roused himself, sighed, and said,--

"Well! I suppose as one brews one must bake."

"I don't understand what you mean," pouted she.

"Perhaps not," he replied. "I suppose that it was what you heard on that occasion that made you change your behaviour to Roger Hamley?

I've noticed how much more civil you were to him of late."

"If you mean that I have ever got to like him as much as...o...b..rne, you are very much mistaken; no, not even though he has offered to Cynthia, and is to be my son-in-law."

"Let me know the whole affair. You overheard,--I will own that it was...o...b..rne about whom we were speaking, though I shall have something to say about that presently--and then, if I understand you rightly, you changed your behaviour to Roger, and made him more welcome to this house than you had ever done before, regarding him as proximate heir to the Hamley estates?"

"I don't know what you mean by 'proximate.'"

"Go into the surgery, and look into the dictionary, then," said he, losing his temper for the first time during the conversation.

"I knew," said she through sobs and tears, "that Roger had taken a fancy to Cynthia; any one might see that; and as long as Roger was only a younger son, with no profession, and nothing but his fellowship, I thought it right to discourage him, as any one would who had a grain of common sense in them; for a clumsier, more common, awkward, stupid fellow I never saw--to be called 'county,' I mean."

"Take care; you'll have to eat your words presently when you come to fancy he'll have Hamley some day."

"No, I shan't," said she, not perceiving his exact drift. "You are vexed now because it is not Molly he's in love with; and I call it very unjust and unfair to my poor fatherless girl. I am sure I have always tried to further Molly's interests as if she was my own daughter."

Mr. Gibson was too indifferent to this accusation to take any notice of it. He returned to what was of far more importance to him.

"The point I want to be clear about is this. Did you or did you not alter your behaviour to Roger in consequence of what you overheard of my professional conversation with Dr. Nicholls? Have you not favoured his suit to Cynthia since then, on the understanding gathered from that conversation that he stood a good chance of inheriting Hamley?"

"I suppose I did," said she, sulkily. "And if I did, I can't see any harm in it, that I should be questioned as if I were in a witness-box. He was in love with Cynthia long before that conversation, and she liked him so much. It was not for me to cross the path of true love. I don't see how you would have a mother show her love for her child if she may not turn accidental circ.u.mstances to her advantage. Perhaps Cynthia might have died if she had been crossed in love; her poor father was consumptive."

"Don't you know that all professional conversations are confidential?

That it would be the most dishonourable thing possible for me to betray secrets which I learn in the exercise of my profession?"

"Yes, of course, you."

"Well! and are not you and I one in all these respects? You cannot do a dishonourable act without my being inculpated in the disgrace. If it would be a deep disgrace for me to betray a professional secret, what would it be for me to trade on that knowledge?"

He was trying hard to be patient; but the offence was of that cla.s.s which galled him insupportably.