Barrington Volume Ii Part 17

"But how can all this be done so hurriedly? You talk of starting at once."

"I must, if I would save your son's cause. The India Board are sending out their emissaries to Calcutta, and I must antic.i.p.ate them--if I cannot do more, by gaining them over to us on the voyage out. It is a case for energy and activity, and I want to employ both."

"The time is very short for all this," said Barrington, again.

"So it is, sir, and so are the few seconds which may rescue a man from drowning! It is in the crisis of my fate that I ask you to stand by me."

"But have you any reason to believe that my granddaughter will hear you favorably? You are almost strangers to each other?"

"If she will not give me the legal right to make her my heir, I mean to usurp the privilege. I have already been with a lawyer for that purpose.

My dear sir," added he, pa.s.sionately, "I want to break with the past forever! When the world sets up its howl against a man, the odds are too great! To stand and defy it he must succ.u.mb or retreat. Now, I mean to retire, but with the honors of war, mark you."

"My sister will never consent to it," muttered Barrington.

"Will you? Have I the a.s.surance of _your_ support?"

"I can scarcely venture to say 'yes,' and yet I can't bear to say 'no'

to you!"

"This is less than I looked for from you," said Stapylton, mournfully.

"I know Dinah so well. I know how hopeless it would be to ask her concurrence to this plan."

"She may not take the generous view of it; but there is a worldly one worth considering," said Stapylton, bitterly.

"Then, sir, if you count on _that_, I would not give a copper half-penny for your chance of success!" cried Barrington, pa.s.sionately.

"You have quite misconceived me; you have wronged me altogether," broke in Stapylton, in a tone of apology; for he saw the mistake he had made, and hastened to repair it. "My meaning was this--"

"So much the better. I'm glad I misunderstood you. But here come the ladies. Let us go and meet them."

"One word,--only one word. Will you befriend me?"

"I will do all that I can,--that is, all that I ought," said Barrington, as he led him away, and re-entered the cottage.

"I will not meet them to-night," said Stapylton, hurriedly. "I am nervous and agitated. I will say good-night now."

This was the second time within a few days that Stapylton had shown an unwillingness to confront Miss Barrington, and Peter thought over it long and anxiously. "What can he mean by it?" said he, to himself. "Why should he be so frank and outspoken with me, and so reserved with her?

What can Dinah know of him? What can she suspect, that is not known to me? It is true they never did like each other,--never 'hit it off'

together; but that is scarcely _his_ fault. My excellent sister throws away little love on strangers, and opens every fresh acquaintance with a very fortifying prejudice against the newly presented. However it happens," muttered he, with a sigh, "_she_ is not often wrong, and _I_ am very seldom right;" and, with this reflection, he turned once again to resume his walk in the garden.

CHAPTER XII. A DOCTOR AND HIS PATIENT

Stapylton did not make his appearance at breakfast; he sent down a message that he had pa.s.sed a feverish night, and begged that Dr. Dill might be sent for. Though Barrington made two attempts to see his guest, the quietness of the room on each occasion implied that he was asleep, and, fearing to disturb him, he went downstairs again on tiptoe.

"This is what the persecution has done, Dinah," said he. "They have brought that stout-hearted fellow so low that he may be the victim of a fever to-morrow."

"Nonsense, Peter. Men of courage don't fall sick because the newspapers calumniate them. They have other things on their minds than such puny attacks."

"So he may, likely enough, too. He is bent heart and soul on what I told you last night, and I 'm not surprised if he never closed his eyes thinking of it."

"Neither did I!" said she, curtly, and left the room.

The doctor was not long in arriving, and, after a word or two with Barrington, hastened to the patient's room.

"Are we alone?" asked Stapylton, cutting short the bland speech with which Dill was making his approaches. "Draw that curtain a bit, and take a good look at me. Are my eyes bloodshot? Are the pupils dilated? I had a bad sunstroke once; see if there be any signs of congestion about me."

"No, I see none. A little flushed; your pulse, too, is accelerated, and the heart's action is labored--"

"Never mind the heart; if the head be well, it will take care of it.

Reach me that pocket-book; I want to acquit one debt to you before I incur another. No humbug between us;" and he pressed some notes into the other's palm as he spoke. "Let us understand each other fully, and at once. I 'm not very ill; but I want _you_."

"And I am at your orders."

"Faithfully,--loyally?"

"Faithfully,--loyally!" repeated the other after him.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 454]

"You've read the papers lately,--you've seen these attacks on me?"

"Yes."

"Well, what do they say and think here--I mean in this house--about them? How do they discuss them? Remember, I want candor and frankness; no humbug. I'll not stand humbug."

"The women are against you."

"Both of them?"

"Both."

"How comes that?--on what grounds?"

"The papers accused you of cruelty; they affirmed that there was no cause for the measures of severity you adopted; and they argued--"

"Don't bore me with all that balderdash. I asked you how was it that these women a.s.sumed I was in the wrong?"

"And I was about to tell you, if you had not interrupted me."

"That is, they believed what they read in the newspapers?"

"Yes."

"And, of course, swallowed that fine story about the Hindoo fellow that I first cut down, and afterwards bribed to make his escape from the hospital?"

"I suspect they half believed it."