The Lost Girl Part 71

"What barrow-load of poison's that?" asked the hawker, approaching.

A crowd began to gather.

"What barrow-load of poison is that!" repeated the doctor. "Why your barrow-load of cuc.u.mbers."

"Oh," said the man, scrutinizing his cuc.u.mbers carefully. To be sure, some were a little yellow at the end. "How's that? c.u.mbers is right enough: fresh from market this morning."

"Fresh or not fresh," said the doctor, mouthing his words distinctly, "you might as well put poison into your stomach, as those things. Cuc.u.mbers are the worst thing you can eat."

"Oh!" said the man, stuttering. "That's 'appen for them as doesn't like them. I niver knowed a c.u.mber do _me_ no harm, an' I eat 'em like a happle." Whereupon the hawker took a "c.u.mber" from his barrow, bit off the end, and chewed it till the sap squirted.

"What's wrong with that?" he said, holding up the bitten cuc.u.mber.

"I'm not talking about what's wrong with that," said the doctor. "My business is what's wrong with the stomach it goes into. I'm a doctor. And I know that those things cause me half my work. They cause half the internal troubles people suffer from in summertime."

"Oh ay! That's no loss to you, is it? Me an' you's partners. More c.u.mbers I sell, more graft for you, 'cordin' to that. What's wrong then. _c.u.m-bers! Fine fresh c.u.m-berrrs! All fresh and juisty, all cheap and tasty--!_" yelled the man.

"I am a doctor not only to cure illness, but to prevent it where I can. And cuc.u.mbers are poison to everybody."

"_c.u.m-bers! c.u.m-bers! Fresh c.u.mbers!_" yelled the man,

Dr. Mitch.e.l.l started his car.

"When will they learn intelligence?" he said to Alvina, smiling and showing his white, even teeth.

"I don't care, you know, myself," she said. "I should always let people do what they wanted--"

"Even if you knew it would do them harm?" he queried, smiling with amiable condescension.

"Yes, why not! It's their own affair. And they'll do themselves harm one way or another."

"And you wouldn't try to prevent it?"

"You might as well try to stop the sea with your fingers."

"You think so?" smiled the doctor. "I see, you are a pessimist. You are a pessimist with regard to human nature."

"Am I?" smiled Alvina, thinking the rose would smell as sweet. It seemed to please the doctor to find that Alvina was a pessimist with regard to human nature. It seemed to give her an air of distinction.

In his eyes, she _seemed_ distinguished. He was in a fair way to dote on her.

She, of course, when he began to admire her, liked him much better, and even saw graceful, boyish attractions in him. There was really something childish about him. And this something childish, since it looked up to her as if she were the saving grace, naturally flattered her and made her feel gentler towards him.

He got in the habit of picking her up in his car, when he could. And he would tap at the matron's door, smiling and showing all his beautiful teeth, just about tea-time.

"May I come in?" His voice sounded almost flirty.

"Certainly."

"I see you're having tea! Very nice, a cup of tea at this hour!"

"Have one too, doctor."

"I will with pleasure." And he sat down wreathed with smiles. Alvina rose to get a cup. "I didn't intend to disturb you, nurse," he said.

"Men are always intruders," he smiled to the matron.

"Sometimes," said the matron, "women are charmed to be intruded upon."

"Oh really!" his eyes sparkled. "Perhaps _you_ wouldn't say so, nurse?" he said, turning to Alvina. Alvina was just reaching at the cupboard. Very charming she looked, in her fresh dress and cap and soft brown hair, very attractive her figure, with its full, soft loins. She turned round to him.

"Oh yes," she said. "I quite agree with the matron."

"Oh, you do!" He did not quite know how to take it. "But you mind being disturbed at your tea, I am sure."

"No," said Alvina. "We are so used to being disturbed."

"Rather weak, doctor?" said the matron, pouring the tea.

"Very weak, please."

The doctor was a little laboured in his gallantry, but unmistakably gallant. When he was gone, the matron looked demure, and Alvina confused. Each waited for the other to speak.

"Don't you think Dr. Mitch.e.l.l is quite coming out?" said Alvina.

"Quite! _Quite_ the ladies' man! I wonder who it is can be _bringing_ him out. A very praiseworthy work, I am sure." She looked wickedly at Alvina.

"No, don't look at me," laughed Alvina, "_I_ know nothing about it."

"Do you think it may be _me_!" said the matron, mischievous.

"I'm sure of it, matron! He begins to show some taste at last."

"There now!" said the matron. "I shall put my cap straight." And she went to the mirror, fluffing her hair and settling her cap.

"There!" she said, bobbing a little curtsey to Alvina.

They both laughed, and went off to work.

But there was no mistake, Dr. Mitch.e.l.l was beginning to expand. With Alvina he quite unbent, and seemed even to sun himself when she was near, to attract her attention. He smiled and smirked and became oddly self-conscious: rather uncomfortable. He liked to hang over her chair, and he made a great event of offering her a cigarette whenever they met, although he himself never smoked. He had a gold cigarette case.

One day he asked her in to see his garden. He had a pleasant old square house with a big walled garden. He showed her his flowers and his wall-fruit, and asked her to eat his strawberries. He bade her admire his asparagus. And then he gave her tea in the drawing-room, with strawberries and cream and cakes, of all of which he ate nothing. But he smiled expansively all the time. He was a made man: and now he was really letting himself go, luxuriating in everything; above all, in Alvina, who poured tea gracefully from the old Georgian tea-pot, and smiled so pleasantly above the Queen Anne tea-cups.

And she, wicked that she was, admired every detail of his drawing-room. It was a pleasant room indeed, with roses outside the French door, and a lawn in suns.h.i.+ne beyond, with bright red flowers in beds. But indoors, it was insistently antique. Alvina admired the Jacobean sideboard and the Jacobean arm-chairs and the Hepplewhite wall-chairs and the Sheraton settee and the Chippendale stands and the Axminster carpet and the bronze clock with Shakespeare and Ariosto reclining on it--yes, she even admired Shakespeare on the clock--and the ormolu cabinet and the bead-work foot-stools and the dreadful Sevres dish with a cherub in it and--but why enumerate. She admired _everything_! And Dr. Mitch.e.l.l's heart expanded in his bosom till he felt it would burst, unless he either fell at her feet or did something extraordinary. He had never even imagined what it was to be so expanded: what a delicious feeling. He could have kissed her feet in an ecstasy of wild expansion. But habit, so far, prevented his doing more than beam.

Another day he said to her, when they were talking of age:

"You are as young as you feel. Why, when I was twenty I felt I had all the cares and responsibility of the world on my shoulders. And now I am middle-aged more or less, I feel as light as if I were just beginning life." He beamed down at her.

"Perhaps you _are_ only just beginning your _own_ life," she said.

"You have lived for your work till now."

"It may be that," he said. "It may be that up till now I have lived for others, for my patients. And now perhaps I may be allowed to live a little more for myself." He beamed with real luxury, saw the real luxury of life begin.