Tony Butler Part 47

said Alice; "but I can see that every whim and caprice he practises is studied as courtiers study the moods of their masters."

"To be sure, darling, naturally," broke in Mrs. Maxwell, who always misunderstood everybody. "Of course, we are only too happy to indulge him in a whim or fancy; and if the doctor thinks turtle would suit him--turtle is so light; I took it for several weeks for luncheon--we can have it at once. Will you touch the bell, Mark, and I'll tell Raikes to telegraph? Who is it he gets it from?"

Mark pulled the bell, but took no notice of her question. "I wish,"

muttered he below his breath, "we had never come here. There 's Bella now, laid up, and here 's Maitland. I 'm certain he's going away, for I overheard Fenton ask about the distance to Dundalk."

"I suppose we might survive even that misfortune," said she, haughtily.

"And one thing I'll swear to," said Mark, walking the room with impatience,--"it 's the last Ireland will see of him."

"Poor Ireland! the failure in the potato-crop was bad enough, but this is more than can be endured."

"That's all very fine, Alice, but I 'm much mistaken if you are as indifferent as you pretend."

"Mark! what do you mean?" said she, angrily.

"Here's Raikes now; and will some one tell him what it is we want?" said Mrs. Maxwell; but the others were far too deeply engaged in their own whispered controversy now to mind her.

"Captain Lyle will tell you by and by, Raikes," said she, gathering up the ma.s.s of loose _impedimenta_ with which she usually moved from one room to the other, and by which, as they fell at every step, her course could always be tracked. "He'll tell you," added she, moving away.

"I think it was caviare, and you are to telegraph for it to Swan and Edgar's--but my head is confused to-day; I'll just go and lie down."

As Mrs. Maxwell left by one door, Alice pa.s.sed out by another; while Mark, whose temper evinced itself in a flushed cheek and a contracted brow, stood at a window, fretfully tapping the ground with his foot.

"Have you any orders, sir?" asked Raikes.

"Orders! No--stay a moment Have many gone away this morning?"

"Nearly all, sir. Except your family and Mr. Maitland, there's n.o.body left but Major Clough, and he 's going, I believe, with Dr. Reede."

"You 've heard nothing of Mr. Maitland going, have you?"

"Oh, yes, sir! his man sent for post-horses about an hour ago."

Muttering impatiently below his breath, Mark opened the window and pa.s.sed out upon the lawn. What an unlucky turn had everything taken! It was but a week ago, and his friend Maitland was in high delight with all around him. The country, the scenery, the people were all charming; indeed, in the intervals between the showers, he had a good word to say for the climate. As for Lyle Abbey, he p.r.o.nounced it the perfection of a country-house; and Mark actually speculated on the time when these opinions of his distinguished friend would have acquired a certain currency, and the judgment of one that none disputed would be recorded of his father's house. And all these successes were now to be reversed by this stupid old sailor's folly,--insanity he might call it; for what other word could characterize the pretension that could claim Norman Maitland for a son-in-law?--Maitland, that might have married, if the law would have let him, half a score of infantas and archd.u.c.h.esses, and who had but to choose throughout Europe the alliance that would suit him. And Alice--what could Alice mean by this impertinent tone she was taking towards him? Had the great man's patience given way under it all, and was he really going away, wearied and tired out?

While Mark thus doubted and reasoned and questioned, Maitland was seated at his breakfast at one side of the fire, while Dr. Reede confronted him at the other.

Though Maitland had sent a message to say he wished to see the doctor, he only gave him now a divided attention, being deeply engaged, even as he talked, in deciphering a telegram which had just reached him, and which was only intelligible through a key to the cipher.

"So, then, doctor, it is simply the return of an old attack,--a thing to be expected, in fact, at his time of life?"

"Precisely, sir. He had one last autumn twelve month, brought on by a fit of pa.s.sion. The old Commodore gives way, rather, to temper."

"Ah! gives way, does he?" muttered Maitland, while he mumbled below his breath, "'seventeen thousand and four D + X, and a gamba,'--a very large blood-letting. By the way, doctor, is not bleeding--bleeding largely--a critical remedy with a man of seventy-six or seven?"

"Very much so, indeed, sir; and, if you observe, I only applied some leeches to the _nuchae_. You misapprehended me in thinking I took blood from him freely."

"Oh, yes, very true," said Maitland, recovering himself. "I have no doubt you treated him with great judgment. It is a case, too, for much caution. Forty-seven and two G's," and he hastily turned over the leaves of his little book, muttering continually, "and two G's, forty-six, forty-seven, with two B's, two F's. Ah! here it is. s.h.i.+vering attacks are dangerous--are they--in these cases?"

"In which cases?" asked the doctor; for his shrewd intelligence at once perceived the double object which Maitland was trying to contemplate.

"In a word, then," continued Maitland, not heeding the doctor's question, but bending his gaze fixedly on the piece of paper before him, scrawled over and blotted by his own hand,--"in a word, then, a man of seventy, seized with paralysis, and, though partially rallied by bleeding, attacked with s.h.i.+vering, is in a very critical state? But how long might he live in that way?"

"We are not now speaking of Commodore Graham, I apprehend?" asked the doctor, slyly.

"No; I am simply putting a case,--a possible case, Doctors, I know, are not fond of these imagined emergencies; lawyers like them."

"Doctors dislike them," broke in Reede, "because they are never given to them in any completeness,--every important sign of pulse and tongue and temperature omitted--"

"Of course you are right," said Maitland, crumpling up the telegram and the other papers; "and now for the Commodore. You are not apprehensive of anything serious, I hope?"

"It 's an anxious case, sir,--a very anxious case; he 's eighty-four."

"Eighty-four!" repeated Maitland, to whom the words conveyed a considerable significance.

"Eighty-four!" repeated the other, once more. "No one would suspect it. Why, Sally Graham is the same age as my wife; they were at school together."

Too polite to push a question which involved a double-shotted answer, Maitland merely said, "Indeed!" and, after a slight pause, added, "You said, I think, that the road to Dundalk led past Commodore Graham's cottage?"

"By the very gate."

"May I offer you a seat with me? I am going that way. I have received news which calls me suddenly to England."

"I thank you much, but I have some visits yet to make before I return to Port-Graham. I promised to stop the night there."

Having charged the doctor to convey to the Commodore's daughters his sincere regret for their father's illness, and his no less sincere hope of a speedy recovery, Maitland endeavored, in recognition of a preliminary question or two about himself, to press the acceptance of a fee; but the doctor, armed with that self-respect and tact his profession so eminently upholds, refused to accept it, and took his leave, perhaps well requited in having seen and spoken with the great Mr. Norman Maitland, of whom half the country round were daily talking.

"Mr. Maitland is not ill, I hope?" said Alice, as she met the doctor on his way through the garden.

"No, Mrs. Trafford; I have been making a friendly call--no more," said the doctor, rather vain that he could thus designate his visit; and with a few words of advice about her sister, he went his way. Alice, meanwhile, saw that Maitland had observed her from his window, and rightly guessed that he would soon be in search of her.

With that feminine instinct that never deceives in such cases, she determined that whatever was to pa.s.s between them should be undisturbed.

She selected a most unfrequented path, bordered on one side by the high laurel-hedge, and on the other by a little rivulet, beyond which lay some rich meadows, backed in the distance by a thick plantation.

She had not gone far when she beard a short quick footstep behind her, and in a few minutes Maitland was at her side. "You forgot to liberate me," said he, "so I had to break my arrest."

"_Signor mio_, you must forgive me; we have had such a morning of confusion and trouble: first, Bella ill,--not seriously, but confined to bed; and then this poor old Commodore,--the doctor has told you all about it; and, last of all, Mark storming about the house, and angry with every one for having caught cold or a fever, and so disgusted (the great) Mr. Maitland that he is actually hurrying away, with a vow to heaven nevermore to put foot in Ireland."

"Be a little serious, and tell me of your mission this morning," said he, gravely.

"Three words will do it. We reached Port-Graham just as the doctor arrived there. The Commodore, it seemed, got home all safe by about four o'clock in the morning; and instead of going to bed, ordered a fire in his dressing-room, and a bottle of mulled port; with which aids to comfort he sat down to write. It would not appear, however, that he had got far in his correspondence, for at six, when his man entered, he found but two lines, and his master, as he thought, fast asleep; but which proved to be a fit of some kind, for he was perfectly insensible.

He rallied, however, and recognized his servant, and asked for the girls. And now Dr. Reede thinks that the danger has in a great measure pa.s.sed off, and that all will go well."

"It is most unhappy,--most unhappy," muttered Mainland. "I am sincerely sorry for it all."

"Of course you are, though perhaps not really to blame,--at least, not blamable in a high degree."

"Not in any degree, Mrs. Trafford."