"Oh! quite right, quite right. I think I would have named a later age than twenty-five."

"So would not I. Louis Philippe will be all right by that time.

That's my lookout. And now, doctor, you know my will; and if I die to-morrow, you will know what I want you to do for me."

"You have merely said the eldest child, Scatcherd?"

"That's all; give it here, and I'll read it to you."

"No, no; never mind. The eldest child! You should be more particular, Scatcherd; you should, indeed. Consider what an enormous interest may have to depend on those words."

"Why, what the devil could I say? I don't know their names; never even heard them. But the eldest is the eldest, all the world over.

Perhaps I ought to say the youngest, seeing that I am only a railway contractor."

Scatcherd began to think that the doctor might now as well go away and leave him to the society of Winterbones and the brandy; but, much as our friend had before expressed himself in a hurry, he now seemed inclined to move very leisurely. He sat there by the bedside, resting his hands on his knees and gazing unconsciously at the counterpane.

At last he gave a deep sigh, and then he said, "Scatcherd, you must be more particular in this. If I am to have anything to do with it, you must, indeed, be more explicit."

"Why, how the deuce can I be more explicit? Isn't her eldest living child plain enough, whether he be Jack, or she be Gill?"

"What did your lawyer say to this, Scatcherd?"

"Lawyer! You don't suppose I let my lawyer know what I was putting.

No; I got the form and the paper, and all that from him, and had him here, in one room, while Winterbones and I did it in another. It's all right enough. Though Winterbones wrote it, he did it in such a way he did not know what he was writing."

The doctor sat a while longer, still looking at the counterpane, and then got up to depart. "I'll see you again soon," said he; "to-morrow, probably."

"To-morrow!" said Sir Roger, not at all understanding why Dr Thorne should talk of returning so soon. "To-morrow! why I ain't so bad as that, man, am I? If you come so often as that you'll ruin me."

"Oh, not as a medical man; not as that; but about this will, Scatcherd. I must think if over; I must, indeed."

"You need not give yourself the least trouble in the world about my will till I'm dead; not the least. And who knows--maybe, I may be settling your affairs yet; eh, doctor? looking after your niece when you're dead and gone, and getting a husband for her, eh? Ha! ha! ha!"

And then, without further speech, the doctor went his way.

CHAPTER XI

The Doctor Drinks His Tea

The doctor got on his cob and went his way, returning duly to Greshamsbury. But, in truth, as he went he hardly knew whither he was going, or what he was doing. Sir Roger had hinted that the cob would be compelled to make up for lost time by extra exertion on the road; but the cob had never been permitted to have his own way as to pace more satisfactorily than on the present occasion. The doctor, indeed, hardly knew that he was on horseback, so completely was he enveloped in the cloud of his own thoughts.

In the first place, that alternative which it had become him to put before the baronet as one unlikely to occur--that of the speedy death of both father and son--was one which he felt in his heart of hearts might very probably come to pa.s.s.

"The chances are ten to one that such a clause will never be brought to bear." This he had said partly to himself, so as to ease the thoughts which came crowding on his brain; partly, also, in pity for the patient and the father. But now that he thought the matter over, he felt that there were no such odds. Were not the odds the other way? Was it not almost probable that both these men might be gathered to their long account within the next four years? One, the elder, was a strong man, indeed; one who might yet live for years to come if he would but give himself fair play. But then, he himself protested, and protested with a truth too surely grounded, that fair play to himself was beyond his own power to give. The other, the younger, had everything against him. Not only was he a poor, puny creature, without physical strength, one of whose life a friend could never feel sure under any circ.u.mstances, but he also was already addicted to his father's vices; he also was already killing himself with alcohol.

And then, if these two men did die within the prescribed period, if this clause in Sir Roger's will were brought to bear, if it should become his, Dr Thorne's, duty to see that clause carried out, how would he be bound to act? That woman's eldest child was his own niece, his adopted bairn, his darling, the pride of his heart, the cynosure of his eye, his child also, his own Mary. Of all his duties on this earth, next to that one great duty to his G.o.d and conscience, was his duty to her. What, under these circ.u.mstances, did his duty to her require of him?

But then, that one great duty, that duty which she would be the first to expect from him; what did that demand of him? Had Scatcherd made his will without saying what its clauses were, it seemed to Thorne that Mary must have been the heiress, should that clause become necessarily operative. Whether she were so or not would at any rate be for lawyers to decide. But now the case was very different.

This rich man had confided in him, and would it not be a breach of confidence, an act of absolute dishonesty--an act of dishonesty both to Scatcherd and to that far-distant American family, to that father, who, in former days, had behaved so n.o.bly, and to that eldest child of his, would it not be gross dishonesty to them all if he allowed this man to leave a will by which his property might go to a person never intended to be his heir?

Long before he had arrived at Greshamsbury his mind on this point had been made up. Indeed, it had been made up while sitting there by Scatcherd's bedside. It had not been difficult to make up his mind to so much; but then, his way out of this dishonesty was not so easy for him to find. How should he set this matter right so as to inflict no injury on his niece, and no sorrow to himself--if that indeed could be avoided?

And then other thoughts crowded on his brain. He had always professed--professed at any rate to himself and to her--that of all the vile objects of a man's ambition, wealth, wealth merely for its own sake, was the vilest. They, in their joint school of inherent philosophy, had progressed to ideas which they might find it not easy to carry out, should they be called on by events to do so. And if this would have been difficult to either when acting on behalf of self alone, how much more difficult when one might have to act for the other! This difficulty had now come to the uncle. Should he, in this emergency, take upon himself to fling away the golden chance which might accrue to his niece if Scatcherd should be encouraged to make her partly his heir?

"He'd want her to go and live there--to live with him and his wife.

All the money in the Bank of England would not pay her for such misery," said the doctor to himself, as he slowly rode into is own yard.

On one point, and one only, had he definitely made up his mind. On the following day he would go over again to Boxall Hill, and would tell Scatcherd the whole truth. Come what might, the truth must be the best. And so, with some gleam of comfort, he went into the house, and found his niece in the drawing-room with Patience Oriel.

"Mary and I have been quarrelling," said Patience. "She says the doctor is the greatest man in a village; and I say the parson is, of course."

"I only say that the doctor is the most looked after," said Mary.

"There's another horrid message for you to go to Silverbridge, uncle.

Why can't that Dr Century manage his own people?"

"She says," continued Miss Oriel, "that if a parson was away for a month, no one would miss him; but that a doctor is so precious that his very minutes are counted."

"I am sure uncle's are. They begrudge him his meals. Mr Oriel never gets called away to Silverbridge."

"No; we in the Church manage our parish arrangements better than you do. We don't let strange pract.i.tioners in among our flocks because the sheep may chance to fancy them. Our sheep have to put up with our spiritual doses whether they like them or not. In that respect we are much the best off. I advise you, Mary, to marry a clergyman, by all means."

"I will when you marry a doctor," said she.

"I am sure nothing on earth would give me greater pleasure," said Miss Oriel, getting up and curtseying very low to Dr Thorne; "but I am not quite prepared for the agitation of an offer this morning, so I'll run away."

And so she went; and the doctor, getting on his other horse, started again for Silverbridge, wearily enough. "She's happy now where she is," said he to himself, as he rode along. "They all treat her there as an equal at Greshamsbury. What though she be no cousin to the Thornes of Ullathorne. She has found her place there among them all, and keeps it on equal terms with the best of them. There is Miss Oriel; her family is high; she is rich, fashionable, a beauty, courted by every one; but yet she does not look down on Mary. They are equal friends together. But how would it be if she were taken to Boxall Hill, even as a recognised niece of the rich man there? Would Patience Oriel and Beatrice Gresham go there after her? Could she be happy there as she is in my house here, poor though it be? It would kill her to pa.s.s a month with Lady Scatcherd and put up with that man's humours, to see his mode of life, to be dependent on him, to belong to him." And then the doctor, hurrying on to Silverbridge, again met Dr Century at the old lady's bedside, and having made his endeavours to stave off the inexorable coming of the grim visitor, again returned to his own niece and his own drawing-room.

"You must be dead, uncle," said Mary, as she poured out his tea for him, and prepared the comforts of that most comfortable meal--tea, dinner, and supper, all in one. "I wish Silverbridge was fifty miles off."

"That would only make the journey worse; but I am not dead yet, and, what is more to the purpose, neither is my patient." And as he spoke he contrived to swallow a jorum of scalding tea, containing in measure somewhat near a pint. Mary, not a whit amazed at this feat, merely refilled the jorum without any observation; and the doctor went on stirring the mixture with his spoon, evidently oblivious that any ceremony had been performed by either of them since the first supply had been administered to him.

When the clatter of knives and forks was over, the doctor turned himself to the hearthrug, and putting one leg over the other, he began to nurse it as he looked with complacency at his third cup of tea, which stood untasted beside him. The fragments of the solid banquet had been removed, but no sacrilegious hand had been laid on the teapot and the cream-jug.

"Mary," said he, "suppose you were to find out to-morrow morning that, by some accident, you had become a great heiress, would you be able to suppress your exultation?"

"The first thing I'd do, would be to p.r.o.nounce a positive edict that you should never go to Silverbridge again; at least without a day's notice."

"Well, and what next? what would you do next?"

"The next thing--the next thing would be to send to Paris for a French bonnet exactly like the one Patience Oriel had on. Did you see it?"

"Well I can't say I did; bonnets are invisible now; besides I never remark anybody's clothes, except yours."

"Oh! do look at Miss Oriel's bonnet the next time you see her. I cannot understand why it should be so, but I am sure of this--no English fingers could put together such a bonnet as that; and I am nearly sure that no French fingers could do it in England."

"But you don't care so much about bonnets, Mary!" This the doctor said as an a.s.sertion; but there was, nevertheless, somewhat of a question involved in it.