CHAPTER XVII

AN UNEXPECTED VISITOR

In appearance the doctor had altered but little since we saw him last. He was the same little wizened old man, with the slight stoop, and the sunken eyes which looked out so keenly from under the thick, overhanging thatch of his shaggy eyebrows. When she heard his voice, and saw him, Margaret, running to him--before Harry, before the servant--put her arms about his neck (she could easily do it, since he was the shorter), and, after looking at him fixedly, as if to make sure that he was still the same man, kissed him on the lips.

"Dr. Twelves, to think of your coming to see me after all these years!"

"And whose fault is it that I haven't come before? whose fault I'd like to know?"

"It certainly isn't mine."

"Not yours? when I hadn't a notion where to look for you, and you took care that I hadn't? It's only by the grace of God I've chanced upon you now. I was looking in a bit of a magazine, at an illustration which seemed to me to be pretty fair, when I saw your name in the corner--Margaret Wallace--in your own handwriting. I can tell you I jumped--there, in the railway carriage--so that I daresay my fellow-passengers thought that I'd a sudden gouty twinge or, maybe, rheumatism, for none can say that I look like a gouty subject. I went straight to the office where the magazine is published, and I asked them to tell me where you might be found. I believe they thought I'd designs upon your life, or, at least, upon your purse. I had to tell them such a yarn before they'd tell me. Then I took care to follow the girl up the stairs, so that, if you meant to deny yourself, you shouldn't have a chance."

"Deny myself?--to you?--doctor! what a notion!--as if I should!" By now the servant had retired; Miss Wallace, who still retained a hand upon her visitor's shoulder, had brought him into the room. "Harry, this is Dr. Twelves, of whom you have so often heard me speak. Doctor, this is Mr. Talfourd, whose wife I hope one day to be."

"I trust, young gentleman, that your deserts are equal to your good fortune, and that you're properly conscious how great that is. I've known this lassie since the time she seemed all hair and legs, for those were the parts of her you noticed most, and there hasn't been a day on which I haven't wanted her to be my wife."

"Now, doctor, that's contrary to the fact; you know you told me more than once that Providence had marked you out to be a bachelor."

"And wasn't that self-evident, since you wouldn't have me? Now, Margaret Wallace, what have you been doing?"

"Doing? I was talking to Harry when you came in."

"I'll be bound that it's plenty of talking to Harry that you do, and will do--particularly later on, when you're Mrs. Harry."

"Doctor!"

"What I mean was, have you made your fortune? or are you drawing pictures for your daily bread?"

She looked at Mr. Talfourd quizzically.

"I have one eye upon my daily bread."

"And it isn't too much of it you see, by the looks of you. You're peaked, and you're thin."

"Oh, doctor! I'm sure I'm not."

"And I'm sure you are, and by virtue of my profession I ought to know. It's a pretty market to which you've brought your pigs. You might be one of the richest women in England, instead of being half-starved--with white cheeks and tired eyes."

"Doctor, how dare you say such things! It's not true! You've not improved!"

"I'm thinking you've not improved either. You've a stubborn heart. Why, all this time, haven't you let some of us know something about you?--if it was only where a line might reach you."

"You know very well why, and I did go to see Mr. Grahame."

"You went to see Cuthbert Grahame? When?" She mentioned the date. "Girl, you're dreaming. It was the day after that he died."

"The day after that he died? I knew he was dead. I heard of it long afterwards by a side wind; but I have never heard any particulars. You none of you told me anything."

"How were we to, when you'd hidden yourself from us in this great city?"

"Of what did he die?"

"If you ask what was on the certificate I can tell you; but if you want to know how death came to him you must inquire of his wife."

"His wife?"

"When he died he was a married man, according to the law of Scotland."

"Dr. Twelves, are you jesting?"

"I'm not. On the day he died he made a will leaving her all that he had in the world--and she had it."

"Who was she?"

"Beyond saying that she was no better than she ought to be, I can tell you nothing."

"Was she some one from the neighbourhood?"

"She was not; she was from England. She dropped from the clouds. I should say--if I may be allowed to do so in this company--on her road to hell. What passed between you and Cuthbert Grahame when you saw him on that day before he died?"

"I didn't see him. Nannie wouldn't let me."

"Nannie wouldn't let you?"

"She would not. She said that Mr. Grahame had forbidden her to admit me into the house."

"She's never spoken a word to me about it. What's been the matter with the woman? But there's something ails your story. That day, and for many days afterwards, she was lying in bed with a broken leg. Was it from her bedroom that she shouted out to you?"

"From her bedroom?--nothing of the kind. She told me through the front door that Mr. Grahame had forbidden her to let me in. When I said that I would come in, and began to break the window to show that I was in earnest, she went to the window above, and poured two buckets of boiling water over me."

"Margaret Wallace! it's dreaming you must have been."

"It was a curious kind of dream. The water scalded my neck, and left a scar which was visible for weeks--wasn't it?"

She turned to Mr. Talfourd, as if for corroboration.

"It was. When I saw it I was disposed to go straight off to Scotland, and give the old harridan a taste of my quality."

"It's as queer a story as any I've heard. Seeing that Nannie was as if she had been glued to her bed, how could she walk about the house as you say, and pour buckets of boiling water on to you through a window?"

"I only know that she did."

"Did you see her?"

She considered a moment.

"No, I didn't. She took care not to show herself."

"She took care not to show herself?"

"She hadn't the courage to let me see her face, but she let me hear her voice, and plenty of it. It was not necessary for me to see her when I heard her. I've been acquainted with Nannie Foreshaw's voice for too many years to be likely to mistake it for any one else's."

"You're sure? I doubt----" The doctor seemed to be considering in his turn. "I can't put the pieces of the puzzle together so that they just fit, but I've a notion that I'm on the way. Margaret Wallace, I've a suspicion that I've been a greater fool even than I thought. After the chances I've had to get wisdom, to get understanding, that's not a nice feeling to have. Between us--you've had a hand!--we've muddled things to a marvel. I'll communicate with Nannie with reference to that little conversation you say you had with her; when I've heard from her I'll talk to you again." He turned to Mr. Talfourd.

"And you, sir, do you make drawings?"

"No; I write stories."

The doctor looked him up and down as if he were a specimen of a species which was new to him.

"Stories? Oh! and is that a man's work? I come of a good old Scottish stock. My forebears have always held that a man should do a man's work. Is writing stories that?"

"It isn't easy, if that's what you mean."

"Not easy? I should have thought you would have found it as easy as lying. I've written them myself; I didn't find it hard. It's just a waste of time. However, I'm not judging you. Is that all you do, write stories?"

"Just at present I'm doing something else as well. I'm acting as private secretary to a lady."

"Private secretary to a lady? You've your own notions of what's a man's work, Mr. Talfourd."

Harry flushed; Margaret laughed.

"And you country Scotchmen have your own ideas of what you're entitled to say."

"You're Scotch yourself, my lassie, on the best side of you; don't gird at your own birth. I ask your pardon, Mr. Talfourd, if I've said anything I ought not to say; but I've known this lassie all her days. She's been to me as the apple of my eye, and--she tells me that you're to be her husband. Would it be going too far, Mr. Talfourd, if I were to ask you what's the name of the lady to whom you're acting as private secretary?"

"Mrs. Lamb--Mrs. Gregory Lamb."

"Mrs. Gregory Lamb? That's odd."

"How is it odd? I hope there's nothing improper about the name."

"It's not that it's improper; it's that I once met a Gregory Lamb. What sort's your Gregory Lamb?"

"He's about my own age, perhaps a little older; not ill-looking; not, I should imagine, a bad fellow in his way."

"Is he a poor man?"

"I believe his wife is very rich."

"His wife? Of course, there's the wife--and she's very rich. The rich woman who married the Gregory Lamb I know would be a very foolish female."

"Mrs. Lamb is certainly not that."

"Then her Gregory's not mine, though it's an unusual conjunction of names. I'm thinking that none but a fool of a woman would ever have married him."