Chapter 15

My father came in to dinner; but, like a true man of the world, he received me back on civil and equal terms, not alluding beyond a word or two to my long absence. We began again as friends; and our mutual knowledge of my mother's fatal malady softened our hearts and manners toward one another. Whenever he was in-doors he waited upon her with sedulous attention. But, for the certainty that death was lurking very near to us, I should have been happier in my home than I had ever been since that momentous week in Sark. But I was also nearer to Olivia, and every throb of my pulse was quickened by the mere thought of that.

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SIXTH.

A NEW PATIENT.

In one sense, time seemed to be standing still with me, so like were the days that followed the one to the other. But in another sense those days fled with awful swiftness, for they were hurrying us both, my mother and me, to a great gulf which would soon, far too soon, lie between us.

Every afternoon Julia came to spend an hour or two with my mother; but her arrival was always formally announced, and it was an understood thing that I should immediately quit the room, to avoid meeting her. There was an etiquette in her resentment which I was bound to observe.

What our circle of friends thought, had become a matter of very secondary consideration to me; but there seemed a general disposition to condone my offences, in view of the calamity that was hanging by a mere thread above me. I discovered from their significant remarks that it had been quite the fashion to visit Sark during the summer, by the Queen of the Isles, which made the passage every Monday; and that Tardif's cottage had been an object of attraction to many of my relatives of every degree. Few of them had caught even a glimpse of Olivia; and I suspected that she had kept herself well out of sight on those days when the weekly steamer flooded the island with visitors.

I had not taken up any of my old patients again, for I was determined that everybody should feel that my residence at home was only temporary. But, about ten days after my return, the following note was brought to me, directed in full to Dr. Martin Dobrée:

"A lady from England, who is only a visitor in Guernsey, will be much obliged by Dr. Martin Dobrée calling upon her, at Rose Villa, Vauvert Road. She is suffering from a slight indisposition; and, knowing Dr. Senior by name and reputation, she would feel great confidence in the skill of Dr. Senior's friend."

I wondered for an instant who the stranger could be, and how she knew the Seniors; but, as there could be no answer to these queries without visiting the lady, I resolved to go. Rose Villa was a house where the rooms were let to visitors during the season, and the Vauvert Road was scarcely five minutes' walk from our house. Julia was paying her daily visit to my mother, and I was at a loss for something to do, so I went at once.

I found a very handsome, fine-looking woman; dark, with hair and eyes as black as a gypsy's, and a clear olive complexion to match. Her forehead was low, but smooth and well-shaped; and the lower part of her face, handsome as it was, was far more developed than the upper. There was not a trace of refinement about her features; yet the coarseness of them was but slightly apparent as yet. She did not strike me as having more than a very slight ailment indeed, though she dilated fluently about her symptoms, and affected to be afraid of fever. It is not always possible to deny that a woman has a violent headache; but, where the pulse is all right, and the tongue clean, it is clear enough that there is not any thing very serious threatening her. My new patient did not inspire me with much sympathy; but she attracted my curiosity, and interested me by the bold style of her beauty.

"You Guernsey people are very stiff with strangers," she remarked, as I sat opposite to her, regarding her with that close observation which is permitted to a doctor.

"So the world says," I answered. "Of course I am no good judge, for we Guernsey people believe ourselves as perfect as any class of the human family. Certainly, we pride ourselves on being a little more difficult of approach than the Jersey people. Strangers are more freely welcome there than here, unless they bring introductions with them. If you have any introductions, you will find Guernsey as hospitable a spot as any in the world."

"I have been here a week," she replied, pouting her full crimson lips, "and have not had a chance of speaking a word, except to strangers like myself who don't know a soul."

That, then, was the cause of the little indisposition which had obtained me the honor of attending her. I indulged myself in a mild sarcasm to that effect, but it was lost upon her. She gazed at me solemnly with her large black eyes, which shone like beads.

"I am really ill," she said, "but it has nothing to do with not seeing anybody, though that's dull. There's nothing for me to do but take a bath in the morning, and a drive in the afternoon, and go to bed very early. Good gracious! it's enough to drive me mad!"

"Try Jersey," I suggested.

"No, I'll not try Jersey," she said. "I mean to make my way here. Don't you know anybody, doctor, that would take pity on a poor stranger?"

"I am sorry to say no," I answered.

She frowned at that, and looked disappointed. I was about to ask her how she knew the Seniors, when she spoke again.

"Do you have many visitors come to Guernsey late in the autumn, as late as October?" she inquired.

"Not many," I answered; "a few may arrive who intend to winter here."

"A dear young friend of mine came here last autumn," she said, "alone, as I am, and I've been wondering, ever since I've been here, however she would get along among such a set of stiff, formal, stand-offish folks. She had not money enough for a dash, or that would make a difference, I suppose."

"Not the least," I replied, "if your friend came without any introductions."

"What a dreary winter she'd have!" pursued my patient, with a tone of exultation. "She was quite young, and as pretty as a picture. All the young men would know her, I'll be bound, and you among them, Dr. Martin. Any woman who isn't a fright gets stared at enough to be known again."

Could this woman know any thing of Olivia? I looked at her more earnestly and critically. She was not a person I should like Olivia to have any thing to do with. A coarse, ill-bred, bold woman, whose eyes met mine unabashed, and did not blink under my scrutiny. Could she be Olivia's step-mother, who had been the ruin of her life?

"I'd bet a hundred to one you know her," she said, laughing and showing all her white teeth. "A girl like her couldn't go about a little poky place like this without all the young men knowing her. Perhaps she left the island in the spring. I have asked at all the drapers' shops, but nobody recollects her. I've very good news for her if I could find her--a slim, middle-sized girl, with a clear, fair skin, and gray eyes, and hair of a bright brown. Stay, I can show you her photograph."

She put into my hands an exquisite portrait of Olivia, taken in Florence. There was an expression of quiet mournfulness in the face, which touched me to the core of my heart. I could not put it down and speak indifferently about it. My heart beat wildly, and I felt tempted to run off with the treasure and return no more to this woman.

"Ah! you recognize her!" she exclaimed triumphantly.

"I never saw such a person in Guernsey," I answered, looking steadily into her face. A sullen and gloomy expression came across it, and she snatched the portrait out of my hand.

"You want to keep it a secret," she said, "but I defy you to do it. I am come here to find her, and find her I will. She hasn't drowned herself, and the earth hasn't swallowed her up. I've traced her as far as here, and that I tell you. She crossed in the Southampton boat one dreadfully stormy night last October--the only lady passenger--and the stewardess recollects her well. She landed here. You must know something about her."

"I assure you I never saw that girl here," I replied, evasively. "What inquiries have you made after her?"

"I've inquired here, and there, and everywhere," she said. "I've done nothing else ever since I came. It is of great importance to her, as well as to me, that I should find her. It's a very anxious thing when a girl like that disappears and is never heard of again, all because she has a little difference with her friends. If you could help me to find her you would do her family a very great service."

"Why do you fix upon me?" I inquired. "Why did you not send for one of the resident doctors? I left Guernsey some time ago."

"You were here last winter," she said; "and you're a young man, and would notice her more."

"There are other young doctors in Guernsey," I remarked.

"Ah! but you've been in London," she answered, "and I know something of Dr. Senior. When you are in a strange place you catch at any chance of an acquaintance."

"Come, be candid with me," I said. "Did not Messrs. Scott and Brown send you here?"

The suddenness of my question took her off her guard and startled her. She hesitated, stammered, and finally denied it with more than natural emphasis.

"I could take my oath I don't know any such persons," she answered. "I don't know whom you mean, or what you mean. All I want is quite honest. There is a fortune waiting for that poor girl, and I want to take her back to those who love her, and are ready to forgive and forget every thing. I feel sure you know something of her. But no body except me and her other friends have any thing to do with it."

"Well," I said, rising to take my leave, "all the information I can give you is, that I never saw such a person here, either last winter or since. It is quite possible she went on to Jersey, or to Granville, when the storm was over. That she did not stay in Guernsey, I am quite sure."

I went away in a fever of anxiety. The woman, who was certainly not a lady, had inspired me with a repugnance that I could not describe. There was an ingrain coarseness about her--a vulgarity excessively distasteful to me as in any way connected with Olivia. The mystery which surrounded her was made the deeper by it. Surely, this person could not be related to Olivia! I tried to guess in what relationship to her she could possibly stand. There was the indefinable delicacy and refinement of a lady, altogether independent of her surroundings, so apparent in Olivia, that I could not imagine her as connected by blood with this woman. Yet why and how should such a person have any right to pursue her? I felt more chafed than I had ever done about Olivia's secret.

I tried to satisfy myself with the reflection that I had put Tardif on his guard, and that he would protect her. But that did not set my mind at ease. I never knew a mother yet who believed that any other woman could nurse her sick child as well as herself; and I could not be persuaded that even Tardif would shield Olivia from danger and trouble as I could, if I were only allowed the privilege. Yet my promise to Julia bound me to hold no communication with her. Besides, this was surely no time to occupy myself with any other woman in the world than my mother. She herself, good, and amiable, and self-forgetting, as she was, might feel a pang of jealousy, and I ought not to be the one to add a single drop of bitterness to the cup she was drinking.

On the other hand, I was distracted at the thought that this stranger might discover the place of Olivia's retreat, from which there was no chance of escape if it were once discovered. A hiding-place like Sark becomes a trap as soon as it is traced out. Should this woman catch the echo of those rumors which had circulated so widely through Guernsey less than three months ago--and any chance conversation with one of our own people might bring them to her ears--then farewell to Olivia's safety and concealment. Here was the squall which had been foretold by Jack. I cursed the idle curiosity of mine which had exposed her to this danger.

I had strolled down some of the quieter streets of the town while I was turning this affair over in my mind, and now, as I crossed the end of Rue Haute, I caught sight of Kate Daltrey turning into a milliner's shop. There was every reasonable probability that she would not come out again soon, for I saw a bonnet reached out of the window. If she were gone to buy a bonnet, she was safe for half an hour, and Julia would be alone. I had felt a strong desire to see Julia ever since I returned home. My mind was made up on the spot. I knew her so well as to be certain that, if I found her in a gentle mood, she would, at any rate, release me from the promise she had extorted from me when she was in the first heat of her anger and disappointment. It was a chance worth trying. If I were free to declare to Olivia my love for her, I should establish a claim upon her full confidence, and we could laugh at further difficulties. She was of age, and, therefore, mistress of herself. Her friends, represented by this odious woman, could have no legal authority over her.

I turned shortly up a side-street, and walked as fast as I could toward the house which was to have been our home. By a bold stroke I might reach Julia's presence. I rang, and the maid who answered the bell opened wide eyes of astonishment at seeing me there. I passed by quickly.

"I wish to speak to Miss Dobrée," I said. "Is she in the drawing-room?"

"Yes, sir," she answered, in a hesitating tone.

I waited for nothing more, but knocked at the drawing-room door for myself, and heard Julia call, "Come in."

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SEVENTH.

SET FREE.

Julia looked very much the same as she had done that evening when I came reluctantly to tell her that my heart was not in her keeping, but belonged to another. She wore the same kind of fresh, light muslin dress, with ribbons and lace about it, and she sat near the window, with a piece of needle-work in her hands; yet she was not sewing, and her hands lay listlessly on her lap. But, for this attitude of dejection, I could have imagined that it was the same day and the same hour, and that she was still ignorant of the change in my feelings toward her. If it had not been for our perverse fate, we should now be returning from our wedding-trip, and receiving the congratulations of our friends. A mingled feeling of sorrow, pity, and shame, prevented me from advancing into the room. She looked up to see who was standing in the doorway, and my appearance there evidently alarmed and distressed her.

"Martin!" she cried.

"May I come in and speak to you, Julia?" I asked.

"Is my aunt worse?" she inquired, hurriedly. "Are you come to fetch me to her?"

"No, no, Julia," I said; "my mother is as well as usual, I hope. But surely you will let me speak to you after all this time?"

"It is not a long time," she answered.

"Has it not been long to you?" I asked. "It seems years to me. All life has changed for me. I had no idea then of my mother's illness."

"Nor I," she said, sighing deeply.

"If I had known it," I continued, "all this might not have happened. Surely, the troubles I shall have to bear must plead with you for me!"

"Yes, Martin," she answered; "yes, I am very sorry for you."

She came forward and offered me her hand, but without looking into my face. I saw that she had been crying, for her eyes were red. In a tone of formal politeness she asked me if I would not sit down. I considered it best to remain standing, as an intimation that I should not trouble her with my presence for long.

"My mother loves you very dearly, Julia," I ventured to say, after a long pause, which she did not seem inclined to break. I had no time to lose, lest Kate Daltrey should come in, and it was a very difficult subject to approach.

"Not more than I love her," she said, warmly. "Aunt Dobrée has been as good to me as any mother could have been. I love her as dearly as my mother. Have you seen her since I was with her this afternoon?"

"No. I have just come from visiting a very curious patient, and have not been home yet."

I hoped Julia would catch at the word curious, and make some inquiries which would open a way for me; but she seemed not to hear it, and another silence fell upon us both. For the life of me I could not utter a syllable of what I had come to say.

"We were talking of you," she said at length, in a harried and thick voice. "Aunt is in great sorrow about you. It preys upon her day and night that you will be dreadfully alone when she is gone, and--and--Martin, she wishes to know before she dies that the girl in Sark will become your wife."

The word struck like a shot upon my ear and brain. What! had Julia and my mother been arranging between them my happiness and Olivia's safety that very afternoon? Such generosity was incredible. I could not believe I had heard aright.

"She has seen the girl," continued Julia, in the same husky tone, which she could not compel to be clear and calm; "and she is convinced she is no adventuress. Johanna says the same. They tell me it is unreasonable and selfish in me to doom you to the dreadful loneliness I feel. If Aunt Dobrée asked me to pluck out my right eye just now, I could not refuse. It is something like that, but I have promised to do it. I release you from every promise you ever made to me, Martin."

"Julia!" I cried, crossing to her and bending over her with more love and admiration than I had ever felt before; "this is very noble, very generous."

"No," she said, bursting into tears; "I am neither noble nor generous. I do it because I cannot help myself, with aunt's white face looking so imploringly at me. I do not give you up willingly to that girl in Sark. I hope I shall never see her or you for many, many years. Aunt says you will have no chance of marrying her till you are settled in a practice somewhere; but you are free to ask her to be your wife. Aunt wants you to have somebody to love you and care for you after she is gone, as I should have done."

"But you are generous to consent to it," I said again.

"So," she answered, wiping her eyes, and lifting up her head; "I thought I was generous; I thought I was a Christian, but it is not easy to be a Christian when one is mortified, and humbled, and wounded. I am a great disappointment to myself; quite as great as you are to me. I fancied myself very superior to what I am. I hope you may not be disappointed in that girl in Sark."

The latter words were not spoken in an amiable tone, but this was no time for criticising Julia. She had made a tremendous sacrifice, that was evident; and a whole sacrifice without any blemish is very rarely offered up nowadays, however it may have been in olden times. I could not look at her dejected face and gloomy expression without a keen sense of self-reproach.

"Julia," I said, "I shall never be quite happy--no, not with Olivia as my wife--unless you and I are friends. We have grown up together too much as brother and sister, for me to have you taken right out of my life without a feeling of great loss. It is I who would lose a right hand or a right eye in losing you. Some day we must be friends again as we used to be."

"It is not very likely," she answered; "but you had better go now, Martin. It is very painful to me for you to be here."

I could not stay any longer after that dismissal. Her hand was lying on her lap, and I stooped down and kissed it, seeing on it still the ring I had given her when we were first engaged. She did not look at me or bid me good-by; and I went out of the house, my veins tingling with shame and gladness. I met Captain Carey coming up the street, with a basket of fine grapes in his hand. He appeared very much amazed.

"Why, Martin!" he exclaimed; "can you have been to see Julia?"

"Yes," I answered.

"Reconciled?" he said, arching his eyebrows, which were still dark and bushy though his hair was grizzled.

"Not exactly," I replied, with a stiff smile, exceedingly difficult to force; "nothing of the sort indeed. Captain, when will you take me across to Sark?"

"Come, come! none of that, Martin," he said; "you're on honor, you know. You are pledged to poor Julia not to visit Sark again."

"She has just set me free," I answered; and out of the fulness of my heart I told him all that had just passed between us. His eyes glistened, though a film came across them which he had to wipe away.

"She is a noble girl," he ejaculated; "a fine, generous, noble girl. I really thought she'd break her heart over you at first, but she will come round again now. We will have a run over to Sark to-morrow."

I felt myself lifted into a third heaven of delight all that evening. My mother and I talked of no one but Olivia. The present rapture so completely eclipsed the coming sorrow, that I forgot how soon it would be upon me. I remember now that my mother neither by word nor sign suffered me to be reminded of her illness. She listened to my rhapsodies, smiling with her divine, pathetic smile. There is no love, no love at all, like that of a mother!

CHAPTER THE TWENTY-EIGHTH.

A BRIGHT BEGINNING.

Not the next day, which was wet and windy, but the day following, did Captain Carey take me over to Sark. I had had time to talk over all my plans for the future with my mother, and I bore with me many messages from her to the girl I was about to ask to become my wife.

Coxcomb as I was, there was no doubt in my mind that I could win Olivia.

To explain my coxcombry is not a very easy task. I do not suppose I had a much higher sense of my own merits than such as is common to man. I admit I was neither shy nor nervous on the one hand, but on the other I was not blatantly self-conceited. It is possible that my course through life hitherto--first as an only son adored by his mother, and secondly as an exceedingly eligible _parti_ in a circle where there were very few young men of my rank and family, and where there were twenty or more marriageable women to one unmarried man--had a great deal to do with my feeling of security with regard to this unknown, poor, and friendless stranger. But, added to this, there was Olivia's own frank, unconcealed pleasure in seeing me, whenever I had had a chance of visiting her, and the freedom with which she had always conversed with me upon any topic except that of her own mysterious position. I was sure I had made a favorable impression upon her. In fact, when I had been talking with her, I had given utterance to brighter and clearer thoughts than I had ever been conscious of before. A word from her, a simple question, seemed to touch the spring of some hidden treasure of my brain, and I had surprised myself by what I had been enabled to say to her. It was this, probably more than her beauty, which had drawn me to her and made me happy in her companionship. No, I had never shown myself contemptible, but quite the reverse, in her presence. No doubt or misgiving assailed me as the yacht carried us out of St. Sampson's Harbor.

Swiftly we ran across, with a soft wind drifting over the sea and playing upon our faces, and a long furrow lying in the wake of our boat. It was almost low tide when we reached the island--the best time for seeing the cliffs. They were standing well out of the water, scarred and chiselled with strange devices, and glowing in the August sunlight with tints of the most gorgeous coloring, while their feet, swathed with brown seaweed, were glistening with the dashing of the waves. I had seen nothing like them since I had been there last, and the view of these wild, rugged crags, with their regal robes of amber and gold and silver, almost oppressed me with delight. If I could but see Olivia on this summit!