第46章

"Ah," said the doctor, "I see.Well, as I said, ordinary friends could not be admitted.Lady Ingleby went, in her sweet impulsive way, without letting them know she was coming; travelled all the way up from Shenstone with no maid, and nothing but a handbag, and arrived at the door in a fly.Robert Mackenzie, the local medical man, who is an inveterate misogynist, feared at first she was an unsuspected wife of Dal's.He seemed to think unannounced ladies arriving in hired vehicles must necessarily turn out to be undesirable wives.I gather they had a somewhat funny scene.But Lady Ingleby soon got round old Robbie, and came near to charming him--as whom does she not? But of course they did not dare let her into Dal's room; so her ministry of consolation appears to have consisted in letting Dal's old housekeeper weep on her beautiful shoulder.It was somewhat of a comedy, hearing about it, when one happened to know them all, better than they knew each other.But to return to practical details.He has had a fully trained male nurse and his own valet to wait on him.He absolutely refused one of our London hospital nurses, who might have brought a little gentle comfort and womanly sympathy to his sick-room.He said he could not stand being touched by a woman; so there it remained.A competent man was found instead.But we can now dispense with him, and I have insisted upon sending up a lady nurse of my own choosing; not so much to wait on him, or do any of a sick-nurse's ordinary duties--his own man can do these, and he seems a capable fellow--but to sit with him, read to him, attend to his correspondence,--there are piles of unopened letters he ought to hear,--in fact help him to take up life again in his blindness.It will need training; it will require tact; and this afternoon I engaged exactly the right person.

She is a gentlewoman by birth, has nursed for me before, and is well up in the special knowledge of mental things which this case requires.Also she is a pretty, dainty little thing; just the kind of elegant young woman poor Dal would have liked to have about him when he could see.He was such a fastidious chap about appearances, and such a connoisseur of good looks.I have written a descriptive account of her to Dr.Mackenzie, and he will prepare his patient for her arrival.She is to go up the day after to-morrow.We are lucky to get her, for she is quite first-rate, and she has only just finished with a long consumptive case, now on the mend and ordered abroad.So you see, Jeanette, all is shaping well.--And now, my dear girl, you have a story of your own to tell me, and my whole attention shall be at your disposal.But first of all I am going to ring for tea, and you and I will have it quietly down here, if you will excuse me for a few minutes while I go upstairs and speak to Flower."* * * * * * *It seemed so natural to Jane to be pouring out the doctor's tea, and to watch him putting a liberal allowance of salt on the thin bread-and-butter, and then folding it over with the careful accuracy which had always characterised his smallest action.In the essentials he had changed so little since the days when as a youth of twenty spending his vacations at the rectory he used to give the lonely girl at the manor so much pleasure by coming up to her school-room tea; and when it proved possible to dispose of her governess's chaperonage and be by themselves, what delightful times they used to have, sitting on the hearth-rug, roasting chestnuts and discussing the many subjects which were of mutual interest.Jane could still remember the painful pleasure of turning hot chestnuts on the bars with her fingers, and how she hastened to do them herself, lest he should be burned.She had always secretly liked and admired his hands, with the brown thin fingers, so delicate in their touch and yet full of such gentle strength.She used to love watching them while he sharpened her pencils or drew wonderful diagrams in her exercise books; thinking how in years to come, when he performed important operations, human lives would depend upon their skill and dexterity.In those early years he had seemed so much older than she.And then came the time when she shot up rapidly into young womanhood and their eyes were on a level and their ages seemed the same.Then, as the years went on, Jane began to feel older than he, and took to calling him "Boy" to emphasise this fact.And then came--Flower;--and complications.And Jane had to see his face grow thin and worn, and his hair whiten on the temples.And she yearned over him, yet dared not offer sympathy.At last things came right for the doctor, and all the highest good seemed his; in his profession; in his standing among men; and, above all, in his heart life, which Flower had always held between her two sweet hands.And Jane rejoiced, but felt still more lonely now she had no companion in loneliness.And still their friendship held, with Flower admitted as a third--a wistful, grateful third, anxious to learn from the woman whose friendship meant so much to her husband, how to succeed where she had hitherto failed.And Jane's faithful heart was generous and loyal to both, though in sight of their perfect happiness her loneliness grew.

And now, in her own hour of need, it had to be Deryck only; and the doctor knew this, and had arranged accordingly; for at last his chance had come, to repay the faithful devotion of a lifetime.The conversation of that afternoon would be the supreme test of their friendship.And so, with a specialist's appreciation of the mental effect of the most trivial external details, the doctor had ordered muffins, and a kettle on the fire, and had asked Jane to make the tea.

By the time the kettle boiled, they had remembered the chestnuts, and were laughing about poor old Fraulein's efforts to keep them in order, and the strategies by which they used to evade her vigilance.

And the years rolled back, and Jane felt herself very much at home with the chum of her childhood.