Johnny Ludlow, Third Series

The only one who showed consideration for Miss Carey was Dr. Knox. He lectured the children about giving her so much unnecessary trouble: he bribed Dicky with lozenges and liquorice from the surgery drawers not to kick or spit at her; and he was, himself, ever kind and considerate to her. They only met at dinner and tea, for Dr. Knox snatched a scrambling breakfast (the servants never got it ready for him in time), and went off betimes to Lefford. Now and then he would come home tolerably early in the evening, but he had a great deal to do, and it did not happen often. Mr. Tamlyn was the parish doctor, and it gave Dr. Knox an incessant round of tramping: for the less pleasant division of the daily professional work was turned over to him.

They got to have a fellow-feeling for one another—Janet and Dr. Knox—a kind of mutual, inward sympathy. Both of them were overworked; in the lot of each was less of comfort than might have been. Dr. Knox compassionated Janet’s hard place and the want of poetry in her life. Janet felt hurt to see him made so little of at home, and she knew about the house being his property, and the seventy-five pounds a-year he paid for the liberty of living in it,—and she knew that most of the income enjoyed by Mrs. Knox ought to have been Arnold’s income. His breakfast was scanty; a cup of coffee, taken standing, and some bread-and-butter, hurriedly eaten. Or he would be off by cockcrow without chance of breakfast, unless he cut a slice of bread in the pantry: or perhaps would have to be out all night. Sometimes he would get home to dinner; one o’clock; more often it was two o-clock, or half-past, or three. In that case, Sally would bring in a plate of half-cold scraps for him—anything that happened to be left. Once, when Janet was carving a leg of mutton, she asked leave to cut off a slice or two that they might be kept warm for the doctor; but Mrs. Knox blew her up—a fine trouble that would be! As to tea, the chances were, if he came in to it at all, that the teapot would be drained: upon which, some lukewarm water would be dashed in, and the loaf and butter put before him. Dr. Knox took it all quietly: perhaps he saw how useless complaint would be.

Mr. Tamlyn’s was a large, handsome, red-brick house, standing in a beautiful garden, in the best and widest street of Lefford. The surgery, built on the side of the house, consisted of two rooms: one containing the drugs and the scales, and so on; the other where the better class of patients waited. Mr. Tamlyn’s wife was dead, and he had one son, who was a cripple. Poor Bertie was thrown down by his nurse when he was a child; he had hardly ever been out of pain since; sometimes the attacks were very bad. It made him more cross and fractious than a stranger would believe; rude, in fact, and self-willed. Mr. Tamlyn just worshipped Bertie. He only lived to one end—that of making money for Bertie, after he, himself, should be gone. Miss Bessy, Mr. Tamlyn’s half-sister, kept his house, and she was the only one who tried to keep down Bertie’s temper. Lefford thought it odd that Mr. Tamlyn did not raise Dr. Knox’s salary: but it was known he wanted to put by what he could for Bertie.

The afternoon sun streamed full on the surgery-window, and Dr. Knox, who had just pelted back from dinner, stood behind the counter, making up bottles of physic. Mr. Tamlyn had an apprentice, a young fellow named Dockett, but he could not be trusted with the physic department yet, as he was apt to serve out calomel powder for camomile flowers. Of the three poor parish patients, waiting for their medicine, two sat and one stood, as there was not a third chair. The doctor spoke very kindly to them about their ailments; he always did that; but he did not seem well himself, and often put his hand to his throat and chest.

The physic and the parish patients done with, he went into the other room, and threw himself into the easy-chair. “I wonder what’s the matter with me?” he said to himself: and then he got up again, for Mr. Tamlyn was coming in. He was a short man with a grey face, and iron grey hair.

“Arnold,” said he, “I wish you’d take my round this afternoon. There are only three or four people who need be seen, and the carriage is at the door.”

“Is Bertie worse than usual?” asked Arnold; who knew that every impediment in Mr. Tamlyn’s way was caused by Bertie.

“He is in a great deal of pain. I really don’t care to leave him.”

“Oh, I’ll go with pleasure,” replied Arnold, passing into the surgery to get his hat.

Mr. Tamlyn walked with him across the flagged court to the gate, talking of the sick people he was going to see. Arnold got into the brougham and was driven away. When he returned, Mr. Tamlyn was upstairs in Bertie’s sitting-room. Arnold went there.

“Anything more come in?” he asked. “Or can the brougham be put up?”

“Dear me, yes; here’s a note from Mrs. Stephenson,” said Mr. Tamlyn, replying to the first question. And he spoke testily: for Mrs. Stephenson was a lady of seventy, who always insisted on his own attendance, objecting to Dr. Knox on the score of his youth. “Well, you must go for once, Arnold. If she grumbles, tell her I was out.”

On a sofa in the room lay Albert Tamlyn; a lad of sixteen with a fretful countenance and rumpled hair. Miss Tamlyn, a pleasant-looking lady of thirty-five, sat by the sofa at work. Arnold Knox went up to the boy, speaking with the utmost gentleness.

“Bertie, my boy, I am sorry you are in pain to-day.”

“Who said I was in pain?” retorted Bertie, ungraciously, his voice as squeaky as a penny trumpet.

“Why, Bertie, you know you are in great pain: it was I who told Dr. Knox so,” interposed the father.

“Then you had no business to tell him so,” shrieked Bertie, with a hideous grin of resentment. “What is it to him?—or to you?—or to anybody?”

“Oh, Bertie, Bertie!” whispered Miss Tamlyn. “Oh, my boy, you should not give way like this.”

“You just give your tongue a holiday, Aunt Bessy,” fired Bertie. “I can’t be bothered by you all in this way.”

Dr. Knox, looking down at him, saw something wrong in the position he was lying in. He stooped, lifted him quietly in his strong arms, and altered it.

“There, Bertie, you will be better now.”

“No, I’m not better, and why d’you interfere?” retorted Bertie in his temper, and burst out crying. It was weary work, waiting on that lad; the house had a daily benefit of it. He had always been given way to: his whims were studied, his tempers went unreproved, and no patience was taught him.

Dr. Knox drove to Mrs. Stephenson’s. He dismissed the carriage when he came out; for he had some patients to see on his own score amongst the poor, and went on to them. They were at tea at Mr. Tamlyn’s when he got back. He looked very ill, and sat down at once.

“Are you tired, Arnold?” asked the surgeon.

“Not very; but I feel out of sorts. My throat is rather painful.”

“What’s the matter with it?”

“Not much, I dare say. A little ulcerated perhaps.”

“I’ll have a look at it presently. Bessy, give Dr. Knox a cup of tea.”

“Thank you, I shall be glad of it,” interposed the doctor. It was not often he took a meal in the house, not liking to intrude on them. When he went up this evening he had thought tea was over.

“We are later than usual,” said Miss Tamlyn, in answer to some remark he made. “Bertie dropped asleep.”

Bertie was awake, and eating relays of bread-and-butter as he lay, speaking to no one. The handsome sitting-rooms downstairs were nearly deserted: Mr. Tamlyn could not bear even to take his meals away from Bertie.

It was growing dusk when Dr. Knox went home. Mr. Tamlyn told him to take a cooling draught and to go to bed early. Mrs. Knox was out for the evening. Janet Carey sat at the old piano in the schoolroom, singing songs to the children to keep them quiet. They were crowding round her, and no one saw him enter the room.

Janet happened to be singing the very song she sang later to us that night at Miss Deveen’s—“Blow, blow, thou wintry wind.” Although she had now been at Rose Villa nearly a twelvemonth, for early summer had come round again, Dr. Knox had never heard her sing. Mrs. Knox hated singing altogether, and especially despised Janet’s: it was only when Janet was alone with the children that she ventured on it, hoping to keep them still. Arnold Knox sat in utter silence; entranced; just as we were at Miss Deveen’s.

“You sing ‘I’ve been roaming,’ now,” called out Dicky, before the song was well over.

“No, not that thing,” dissented Mina. “Sing ‘Pray, Goody,’ Janet.” They had long since called her by her Christian name.

The whole five (the other three taking sides), not being able to agree, plunged at once into a hot dispute. Janet in vain tried to make peace by saying she would sing both songs, one after the other: they did not listen to her. In the midst of the noise, Sally looked in to say James had caught a magpie; and the lot scampered off.

Janet Carey heaved a sad sigh, and passed her hand over her weary brow. She had had a tiring day: there were times when she thought her duties would get beyond her. Rising to follow the rebellious flock, she caught sight of Dr. Knox, seated back in the wide old cane chair.

“Oh! I—I beg your pardon. I had no idea any one was here.”

He came forward smiling; Janet had sat down again in her surprise.

“And though I am here? Why should you beg my pardon, Miss Carey?”

“For singing before you. I did not know—I am very sorry.”

“Perhaps you fancy I don’t like singing?”

“Mine is such poor singing, sir. And the songs are so old. I can’t play: I often only play to them with one hand.”

“The singing is so poor—and the songs are so old, that I was going to ask of you—to beg of you—to sing one of them again for me.”

She stood glancing up at him with her nice eyes, as shy as could be, uncertain whether he was mocking her.

“Do you know, Miss Carey, that I never ask a young lady for a song now. I don’t care to hear the new songs, they are so poor and frivolous: the old ones are worth a king’s ransom. Won’t you oblige me?”

“What shall I sing?”

“The one you have just sung. ‘Blow, blow, thou wintry wind.’”

He drew a chair close, and listened; and seemed lost in thought when it was over. Janet could not conveniently get up without pushing the stool against him, and so sat in silence.

“My mother used to sing that song,” he said, looking up. “I can recall her every note as well as though I had heard her yesterday. ‘As friends remembering not’! Ay: it’s a harsh world—and it grows more harsh and selfish day by day. I don’t think it treats you any too well, Miss Carey.”

“Me, sir?”

“Who remembers you?”

“Not many people. But I have never had any friends to speak of.”

“Will you give me another song? The one I heard Mina ask you for—‘Pray, Goody.’ My mother used to sing that also.”

“I don’t know whether I must stay. The children will be getting into mischief.”

“Never mind the children. I’ll take the responsibility.”

Janet sang the song. Before it was finished the flock came in again. Dicky had tried to pull the magpie’s feathers out, so James had let it fly.

After this evening, it somehow happened that Dr. Knox often came home early, although his throat was well again. He liked to make Miss Carey sing; and to talk to her; and to linger in the garden with her and the children in the twilight. Mrs. Knox was rarely at home, and had no idea how sociable her step-son was becoming. Lefford and its neighbourhood followed the unfashionable custom of giving early soirées: tea at six, supper at nine, at home by eleven. James used to go for his mistress; on dark nights he took a lighted lantern. Mrs. Knox would arrive at home, her gown well pinned up, and innocent of any treasonable lingerings out-of-doors or in. It was beyond Janet’s power to get Mina and Lotty to bed one minute before they chose to go: though her orders from Mrs. Knox on the point were strict. As soon as their mother’s step was heard they would make a rush for the stairs. Janet had to follow them, as that formed part of her duty: and by the time Mrs. Knox was indoors, the rooms were free, and Arnold was shut up in his study with his medical books and a skeleton.

For any treason that met the eye or the ear, Mrs. Knox might have assisted at all the interviews. The children might have repeated every word said to one another by the doctor and Janet, and welcome. The talk was all legitimate: of their own individual, ordinary interests, perhaps; of their lost parents; their past lives; the present daily doings; or, as the Vicar of Wakefield has it, of pictures, taste, Shakespeare, and the musical glasses. Dr. Knox never said such a thing to her as, miss, I am in love with you; Janet was the essence of respectful shyness, and called him sir.

One evening something or other caused one of the soirées to break up midway, and Mrs. Knox came home by twilight in her pink gauze gown. Instead of ringing at the front-door, she came round the garden to the lawn, knowing quite well the elder children were not gone to bed, and would probably be in the garden-room. Very softly went she, intending to surprise them. The moon shone full on the glass-doors.

The doors were shut. And she could see no children. Only Janet Carey sitting at the piano, and Dr. Knox sitting close by her, his eyes resting on her face, and an unmistakable look of—say friendship—in them. Mrs. Knox took in the whole scene by the light of the one candle standing on the table.

She let go the pink skirt and burst open the doors. Imagination is apt to conjure up skeletons of the future; a whole army of skeletons rushed into hers, any one of them ten times more ugly than that real skeleton in the doctor’s study. A vision of his marrying Janet and taking possession of the house, and wanting all his money for himself instead of paying the family bills with it, was the worst.

Before a great and real dread, passion has to be silent. Mrs. Knox felt that she should very much like to buffet both of them with hands and tongue: but policy restrained her.

“Where are the children?” she began, as snappish as a fox; but that was only usual.

Janet had turned round on the music-stool; her meek hands dropping on her lap, her face turning all the colours of the rainbow. Dr. Knox just sat back in his chair and carelessly hummed to himself the tune Janet had been singing.

“Mina and Lotty are at Mrs. Hampshire’s, ma’am,” answered Janet. “She came to fetch them just after you left, and said I might send in for them at half-past nine. The little ones are in bed.”

“Oh,” said Mrs. Knox. “It’s rather early for you to be at home; is it not, Arnold?”

“Not particularly, I think. My time for coming home is always uncertain, you know.”

He rose, and went to his room as he spoke. Janet got out the basket of stockings; and Mrs. Knox sat buried in a brown study.

After this evening things grew bad for Miss Carey. Mrs. Knox watched. She noted her step-son’s manner to Janet, and saw that he liked her ever so much more than was expedient. What to do, or how to stop it, she did not know, and was at her wits’ end. To begin with, there was nothing to stop. Had she put together a whole week’s looks and words of Arnold’s, directed to Janet, she could not have squeezed one decent iota of complaint out of the whole. Neither dared she risk offending Arnold. What with the perpetual soirées out, and the general daily improvidence at home, Mrs. Knox was never in funds, and Arnold found oceans of household bills coming in to him. Tradesmen were beginning, as a rule now, to address their accounts to Dr. Knox. Arnold paid them; he was good-natured, and sensitively averse to complaining to his step-mother; but he thought it was hardly fair. What on earth she did with her income he could not imagine: rather than live in this chronic state of begging, she might have laid down the pony-carriage.

Not being able to attack the doctor, Mrs. Knox vented all her venom on Miss Carey. Janet was the dray horse of the family, and therefore could not be turned away: she was too useful to Mrs. Knox to be parted with. Real venom it was; and hard to be borne. Her work grew harder, and she was snubbed from morning till night. The children’s insolence to her was not reproved; Mina took to ordering her about. Weary and heart-sick grew she: her life was no better than Cinderella’s: the only ray of comfort in it being the rare snatches of intercourse with Dr. Knox. He was like a true friend to her, and ever kind. He might have been kinder had he known what sort of a life she really led. But Mrs. Knox was a diplomatist, and the young fry did not dare to worry people very much, or to call names before their big brother Arnold.

II.

“Has Dr. Knox come in, Mr. Dockett?”

Mr. Dockett, lounging over the counter to tease the dog, brought himself straight with a jerk, and faced his master, Mr. Tamlyn.

“Not yet, sir.”

“When he comes in, ask him if he’ll be so kind as step to me in the dining-room.”

Mr. Tamlyn shut the surgery-door, and the apprentice whistled to the dog, which had made its escape. Presently Dr. Knox came across the court-yard and received the message.

“Mr. Tamlyn wants you, sir, please. He is in the dining-room.”

“Have you nothing to do, Dockett? Just set on and clean those scales.”

The dining-room looked out on the garden and on the playing fountain. It was one of the prettiest rooms in Lefford; with white-and-gold papered walls, and mirrors, and a new carpet. Mr. Tamlyn liked to have things nice at home, and screwed the money out of the capital put by for Bertie. He sat at the table before some account-books.

“Sit down, Arnold,” he said, taking off his spectacles. “I have some news for you: I hope it won’t put you out too much.”

It did put Dr. Knox out very considerably, and it surprised him even more. For some time past now he had been cherishing a private expectation that Mr. Tamlyn would be taking him into partnership, giving him probably a small share only at first. Of all things it seemed the most likely to Dr. Knox: and, wanting in self-assertion though he was, it seemed to him that it would be a right thing to do. Mr. Tamlyn had no one to succeed him: and all the best part of his practice was formerly Mr. Knox’s. Had Arnold only been a little older when his father died, he should have succeeded to it himself: there would have been little chance of Mr. Tamlyn’s getting any of it. In justice, then, if Mr. Tamlyn now, or later, took a partner at all, it ought to be Arnold. But for looking forward to this, Dr. Knox had never stayed on all this time at the paltry salary paid him, and worked himself nearly to a skeleton. As old Tamlyn talked, he listened as one in a dream, and he learnt that his own day-dream was over.

Old Tamlyn was about to take a partner: some gentleman from London, a Mr. Shuttleworth. Mr. Shuttleworth was seeking a country practice, and would bring in three thousand pounds. Arnold’s services would only be required to the end of the year, as Mr. Shuttleworth would join on the first of January.

“There won’t be room for three of us, Arnold—and Dockett will be coming on,” said Mr. Tamlyn. “Besides, at your age, and with your talents, you ought to be doing something better for yourself. Don’t you see that you ought?”

“I have seen it for some time. But—the truth is,” added Arnold, “though I hardly like to own to it now, I have been cherishing a hope of this kind for myself. I thought, Mr. Tamlyn, you might some time offer it to me.”

“And so I would, Arnold, and there’s no one I should like to take as partner half so well as yourself, but you have not the necessary funds,” said the surgeon with eagerness. “I see what you are thinking, Arnold—that I might have taken you without premium: but I must think of my poor boy. Shuttleworth brings in three thousand: I would have taken you with two.”

“I could not bring in two hundred, let alone two thousand,” said Dr. Knox.

“There’s where it is. To tell you the truth, Arnold, I am getting tired of work; don’t seem so much up to it as I was. Whoever comes in will have to do more even than you have done, and of course will expect to take at least a half-share of the yearly profits. I should not put by much then: I could not alter my style of living, you know, or put down the carriages and horses, or anything of that sort: and I must save for poor Bertie. A sum of three thousand pounds means three thousand to me.”

“Are the arrangements fully made?” asked Dr. Knox.

“Yes. Mr. Shuttleworth came down to Lefford yesterday, and has been going into the books with me this morning. And, by the way, Arnold, I hope you will meet him here at dinner to-night. I should not a bit wonder, either, but he might tell you of some opening for yourself: he seems to know most of the chief medical men in London. He is selling a good practice of his own. It is his health that obliges him to come to the country.”

“I hope you will suit one another,” said Dr. Knox; for he knew that it was not every one who could get on with fidgety old Tamlyn.

“We are to give it a six months’ trial,” said Tamlyn. “He would not bind himself without that. At the end of the six months, if both parties are not satisfied, we cancel the agreement: he withdraws his money, and I am at liberty to take a fresh partner. For that half-year’s services he will receive his half-share of profits: which of course is only fair. You see I tell you all, Arnold.”

Dr. Knox dined with them, and found the new man a very pleasant fellow, but quite as old as Tamlyn. He could not help wondering how he would relish the parish work, and said so in a whisper to Mr. Tamlyn while Shuttleworth was talking to Bertie.

“Oh, he thinks it will be exercise for him,” replied the surgeon. “And Dockett will be coming on, you know.”

It was a dark night, the beginning of November, wet and splashy. Mrs. Knox had a soirée at Rose Villa; and when the doctor reached home he met the company coming forth with cloaks and lanterns and clogs.

“Oh, it’s you, Arnold, is it!” cried Mrs. Knox. “Could you not have come home for my evening? Two of the whist-tables had to play dummy: we had some disappointments.”

“I stayed to dine with Mr. Tamlyn,” said Arnold.

Sitting together over the fire, he and she alone, Mrs. Knox asked him whether he would not give her a hundred pounds a-year for his board, instead of seventy-five. Which was uncommonly cool, considering what he paid for her besides in housekeeping bills. Upon which, Arnold told her he should not be with her beyond the close of the year: he was going to leave Lefford. For a minute, it struck her dumb.

“Good Heavens, Arnold, how am I to keep the house on without your help? I must say you have no consideration. Leave Lefford!”

“Mr. Tamlyn has given me notice,” replied Arnold. “He is taking a partner.”

“But—I just ask you—how am I to pay my way?”

“It seems to me that your income is quite sufficient for that, mother. If not—perhaps—if I may suggest it—you might put down the pony-chaise.”

Mrs. Knox shrieked out that he was a cruel man. Arnold, who never cared to stand scenes, lighted his candle and went up to bed.

Shuttleworth had taken rather a fancy to Dr. Knox; perhaps he remembered, too, that he was turning him adrift. Anyway, he bestirred himself, and got him appointed to a medical post in London, where Arnold would receive two hundred a-year, and his board.

“I presume you know that I am about to run away, Miss Carey,” said Dr. Knox, hastening up to join her one Sunday evening when they were coming out of church at Lefford.

“As if every one did not know that!” cried Mina. “Where’s mamma, Arnold? and Lotty?”

“They are behind, talking to the Parkers.”

The Parkers were great friends of Mina’s, so she ran back. The doctor and Janet walked slowly on.

“You will be glad to leave, sir,” said Janet, in her humble fashion. “Things have not been very comfortable for you at home—and I hear you are taking a much better post.”

“I shall be sorry to leave for one thing—that is, because I fear things may be more uncomfortable for you,” he spoke out bravely. “What Rose Villa will be when all restraint is taken from the children, and with other undesirable things, I don’t like to imagine.”

“I shall do very well,” said Janet, meekly.

“I wonder you put up with it,” he exclaimed. “You might be ten thousand times better and happier elsewhere.”

“But I fear to change: I have no one to recommend me or to look out for me, you know.”

“There’s that lady I’ve heard you speak of—your aunt, Miss Cattledon.”

“I could not think of troubling her. My mother’s family do not care to take much notice of me. They thought my father was not my mother’s equal in point of family, and when she married him, they turned her off, as it were. No, sir, I have only myself to look to.”

“A great many of us are in the same case,” he said. “Myself, for instance. I have been indulging I don’t know what day-dreams for some time past: one of them that Mr. Tamlyn would give me a share in his practice: and—and there were others to follow in due course. Vain dreams all, and knocked on the head now.”

“You will be sure to get on,” said Janet.

“Do you think so?” he asked very softly, looking down into Janet’s nice eyes by the gaslight in the road.

“At least, I hope you will.”

“Well, I shall try for it.”

“Arnold!—come back, Arnold; I want you to give me your arm up the hill,” called out Mrs. Knox.

Dr. Knox had to enter on his new situation at quarter-day, the twenty-fifth of December; so he went up to London on Christmas-Eve. Which was no end of a blow to old Tamlyn, as it left all the work on his own shoulders for a week.

III.

From two to three months passed on. One windy March day, Mrs. Knox sat alone in the garden-room, worrying over her money matters. The table, drawn near the fire, was strewed with bills and tradesmen’s books; the sun shone on the closed glass-doors.

Mrs. Knox’s affairs had been getting into an extremely hopeless condition. It seemed, by the accumulation of present debts, that Arnold’s money must have paid for everything. Her own income, which came in quarterly, appeared to dwindle away, she knew not how or where. A piteous appeal had gone up a week ago to Arnold, saying she should be in prison unless he assisted her, for the creditors were threatening to take steps. Arnold’s answer, delivered this morning, was a fifty-pound note enclosed in a very plain letter. It had inconvenienced him to send the money, he said, and he begged her fully to understand that it was the last he should ever send.

So there sat Mrs. Knox before the table in an old dressing-gown, and her black hair more dishevelled than a mop. The bills, oceans of them, and the fifty-pound note lay in a heap together. Master Dicky had been cutting animals out of a picture-book, leaving the scraps on the cloth and the old carpet. Lotty had distributed there a few sets of dolls’ clothes. Gerty had been tearing up a newspaper for a kite-tail. The fifty pounds would pay about a third of the debts, and Mrs. Knox was trying to apportion a sum to each of them accordingly.

It bothered her finely, for she was no accountant. She could manage to add up without making very many mistakes; but when it came to subtraction, her brain went into a hopeless maze. Janet might have done it, but Mrs. Knox was furious with Janet and would not ask her. Ill-treated, over-worked, Janet had plucked up courage to give notice, and was looking out for a situation in Lefford. Just now, Janet was in the kitchen, ironing Dick’s frilled collars.

“Take fifty-three from fourteen, and how much does remain?” groaned Mrs. Knox over the shillings. At that moment there was a sound of carriage-wheels, and a tremendous ring at the door. Sally darted in.

“Oh, ma’am, it’s my Lady Jenkins! I knew her carriage at a distance. It have got red wheels!”

“Oh, my goodness!” cried Mrs. Knox, starting up. “Don’t open the door yet, Sally: let me get upstairs first. Her ladyship’s come to take me a drive, I suppose. Go and call Miss Carey—or stay, I’ll go to her.”

Mrs. Knox opened one of the glass-doors, and whisked round to the kitchen. She bade Janet leave the ironing and go to do her books and bills: hastily explaining that she wanted to know how far fifty pounds would go towards paying a fair proportion off each debt. Janet was to make it all out in figures.

“Be sure and take care of the note—I’ve left it somewhere,” called back Mrs. Knox as she escaped to the stairs in hurry and confusion; for my Lady Jenkins’s footman was working both bell and knocker alarmingly.

Janet only half comprehended. She went round to the garden-room, shut the glass-doors, and began upon the bills and books. But first of all, she looked out for the letters that were lying about, never supposing that the special charge had reference to anything else: at least, she said so afterwards: and put them inside Mrs. Knox’s desk. From first to last, then and later, Janet Carey maintained that she did not see any bank-note.

Mrs. Knox dressed herself with Sally’s help, and went out with my Lady Jenkins—the ex-Mayor of Lefford’s wife. The bills and the calculations made a long job, and Janet’s mind was buried in it, when a startling disturbance suddenly arose in the garden: Dicky had climbed into the mulberry-tree and fallen out of it. The girls came, dashing open the glass-doors, saying he was dead. Janet ran out, herself nearly frightened to death.

Very true. If Dicky was not dead, he looked like it. He lay white and cold under the tree, blood trickling down his face. James galloped off for Mr. Tamlyn. The two maids and Janet carried Dicky into the kitchen, and put him on the ironing-board, with his head on an old cushion. That revived him; and when Mr. Shuttleworth arrived, for Tamlyn was out, Dicky was demanding bread-and-treacle. Shuttleworth put some diachylon plaster on his head, ordered him to bed, and told him not to get into trees again.

Their fears relieved, the maids had time to remember common affairs. Sally found all the sitting-room fires out, and hastened to light them. As soon as Janet could leave Dicky, who had persisted in going to bed in his boots, she went back to the accounts. Mrs. Knox came in before they were done. She blew up Janet for not being quicker, and when she had recovered the shock of Dicky’s accident, she blew her up for that.

“Where’s the note?” she snapped.

“What note, ma’am?” asked Janet.

“The bank-note. The bank-note for fifty pounds that I told you to take care of.”

“I have not seen any bank-note,” said Janet.

Well, that began the trouble. The bank-note was searched for, and there was neither sign nor symptom of it to be found. Mrs. Knox accused Janet Carey of stealing it, and called in a policeman. Mrs. Knox made her tale good to the man, representing Janet as a very black girl indeed; but the man said he could not take her into custody unless Mrs. Knox would charge her formally with the theft.

And that, Mrs. Knox hesitated to do. She told the policeman she would take until the morrow to consider of it. The whole of that evening, the whole of the night, the whole of the next morning till midday, Janet spent searching the garden-room. At midday the policeman appeared again, and Janet went into a sort of fit.

When Mr. Shuttleworth was sent for to her, he said it was caused by fright, and that she had received a shock to the nervous system. For some days she was delirious, on and off; and when she could escape Sally’s notice, who waited on her, they’d find her down in the garden-room, searching for the note, just as we afterwards saw her searching for it in her sleep at Miss Deveen’s. It chanced that the two rooms resembled each other remarkably: in their situation in the houses, in their shape and size and building arrangements, and in their opening by glass-doors to the garden. Janet subsided into a sort of wasting fever; and Mrs. Knox thought it time to send for Miss Cattledon. The criminal proceedings might wait, she told Janet: like the heartless woman that she was! Not but that the loss of the money had thrown her flat on her beam-ends.

Miss Cattledon came. Janet solemnly declared, not only that she had not the bank-note, but that she had never seen the note: never at all. Mrs. Knox said no one but Janet could have taken it, and but for her illness, she would be already in prison. Miss Cattledon told Mrs. Knox she ought to be ashamed of herself for suspecting Janet Carey, and took Janet off by train to Miss Deveen’s. Janet arrived there in a shivering-fit, fully persuaded that the Lefford policemen were following her by the orders of Mrs. Knox.

And for the result of it all we must go on to the next paper.

DR. KNOX.

The above letter reached Dr. Knox in London one morning in April. He made it right with the authorities to whom he was subject, and reached Lefford the same afternoon.

Leaving his bag at the station, he went straight to Mr. Tamlyn’s house; every other person he met halting to shake hands with him. Entering the iron gates, he looked up at the windows, but saw no one. The sun shone on the pillared portico, the drawing-room blinds beside it were down. Dr. Knox crossed the flagged courtyard, and passed off to enter by the route most familiar to him, the surgery, trodden by him so often in the days not long gone by. Mr. Dockett stood behind the counter, compounding medicines, with his coat-cuffs and wristbands turned up.

“Well, I never!” exclaimed the young gentleman, dropping a bottle in his astonishment as he stared at Dr. Knox. “You are about the last person I should have expected to see, sir.”

By which remark the doctor found that Mr. Tamlyn had not taken his apprentice into his confidence. “Are you all well here?” he asked, shaking hands.

“All as jolly as circumstances will let us be,” said Mr. Dockett. “Young Bertie has taken a turn for the worse.”

“Has he? I am sorry to hear that. Is Mr. Tamlyn at home? If so, I’ll in and see him.”

“Oh, he’s at home,” was the answer. “He has hardly stirred out-of-doors for a week, and Shuttleworth says he’s done to death with the work.”

Going in as readily as though he had not left the house for a day, Dr. Knox found Mr. Tamlyn in the dining-room: the pretty room that looked to the garden and the fountain. He was sitting by the fire, his hand rumpling his grey hair: a sure sign that he was in some bother or tribulation. In the not quite four months that had passed since Dr. Knox left him, he had changed considerably: his hair was greyer, his face thinner.

“Is it you, Arnold? I am glad. I thought you’d come if you could.”

Dr. Knox drew a chair near the fire, and sat down. “Your letter gave me concern,” he said. “And what do you mean by talking about a peck of trouble?”

“A peck of trouble!” echoed Mr. Tamlyn. “I might have said a bushel. I might have said a ton. There’s trouble on all sides, Arnold.”

“Can I help you out of it in any way?”

“With some of it, I hope you can: it’s why I sent for you. But not with all: not with the worst. Bertie’s dying, Arnold.”

“I hope not!”

“As truly as that we are here talking to one another, I believe him to be literally dying,” repeated the surgeon, solemnly, his eyes filling and his voice quivering with pain. “He has dropped asleep, and Bessy sent me out of the room: my sighs wake him, she says. I can’t help sighing, Arnold: and sometimes the sigh ends with a groan, and I can’t help that.”

Dr. Knox didn’t see his way clear to making much answer just here.

“I’ve detected the change in him for a month past; in my inward heart I felt sure he could not live. Do you know what your father used to say, Arnold? He always said that if Bertie lived over his sixteenth or seventeenth year, he’d do; but the battle would be just about that time. Heaven knows, I attached no importance to the opinion: I have hardly thought of it: but he was right, you see. Bertie would be seventeen next July, if he were to live.”

“I’m sure I am very grieved to hear this—and to see your sorrow,” spoke Arnold.

“He is so changed!” resumed Mr. Tamlyn, in a low voice. “You remember how irritable he was, poor fellow?—well, all that has gone, and he is like an angel. So afraid of giving trouble; so humble and considerate to every one! It was this change that first alarmed me.”

“When did it come on?”

“Oh, weeks ago. Long before there was much change for the worse to be seen in him. Only this morning he held my hand, poor lad, and—and——” Mr. Tamlyn faltered, coughed, and then went on again more bravely. “He held my hand between his, Arnold, and said he thought God had forgiven him, and how happy it would all be when we met in heaven. For a long while now not a day has passed but he has asked us to forgive him for his wicked tempers—that’s his word for it, wicked—the servants, and all.”

“Is he in much pain?”

“Not much now. He has been in a great deal at times. But it made no difference, pain or no pain, to his sweetness of temper. He will lie resigned and quiet, the drops pouring down his face with the agony, never an impatient word escaping him. One day I heard him tell Bessy that angels were around him, helping him to bear it. We may be sure, Arnold, when so extraordinary a change as that takes place in the temperament, the close of life is not far off.”

“Very true—as an ordinary rule,” acquiesced Dr. Knox. “And now, how can I help you in this trouble?”

“In this trouble?—not at all,” returned Mr. Tamlyn, rousing himself, and speaking energetically, as if he meant to put the thought behind him. “This trouble no earthly being can aid me in, Arnold; and I don’t think there’s any one but yourself I’d speak to of it: it lies too deep, you see; it wrings the soul. I could die of this trouble: I only fret at the other.”

“And what is the other?”

“Shuttleworth won’t stay.”

“Won’t he!”

“Shuttleworth says the kind of practice is not what he has been accustomed to, and the work’s too hard, and he does not care how soon he leaves it. And yet Dockett has come on surprisingly, and takes his share now. The fact is, Arnold, Shuttleworth is just as lazy as he can hang together: he’d like to treat a dozen rose-water patients a-day, and go through life easily. My belief is, he means to do it.”

“But that will scarcely bring grist to his mill, will it?” cried Dr. Knox.

“His mill doesn’t want grist; there’s the worst of it,” said Tamlyn. “The man was not badly off when he came here: but since then his only brother must go and die, and Shuttleworth has come into all his money. A thousand a-year, if it’s a penny.”

“Then, I certainly don’t wonder at his wanting to give up the practice,” returned the doctor, with a smile.

“That’s not all,” grumbled old Tamlyn. “He wants to take away Bessy.”

“To take away Bessy!”

“The two have determined to make themselves into one, I believe. Bessy only hesitated because of leaving poor Bertie. That impediment will not be in her way long.”

He sighed as he spoke. Dr. Knox did not yet see what he was wanted for: and asked again.

“I’ve been leading up to it,” said Mr. Tamlyn. “You must come back to me, Arnold.”

“On the same terms as before?” inquired the doctor, after a pause.

“Nonsense. You’d say ‘No,’ off-hand, if I proposed them. In Shuttleworth’s place.”

“Of course, Mr. Tamlyn, I could not come—I would not come unless it were made worth my while. If it were, I should like it of all things.”

“Yes, just so; that’s what I mean. Don’t you like your post in London?”

“I like it very well, indeed. And I have had no doubt that it will lead to something better. But, if I saw a fair prospect before me here, I should prefer to come back to Lefford.”

“That shall be made fair enough. Things have changed with me, Arnold: and I shouldn’t wonder but you will some time, perhaps not very far distant, have all my practice in your own hands. I feel to be getting old: spirits and health are alike broken.”

“Nay, not old yet, Mr. Tamlyn. You may wait a good twenty years for that.”

“Well, well, we’ll talk further at another interview. My mind’s at rest now, and that’s a great thing. If you had refused, Arnold, I should have sold my practice for an old song, and gone clean away: I never could have stood being associated with another stranger. You are going up home, I conclude. Will you come in this evening?”

“Very well,” said Dr. Knox, rising. “Can I go up and see Bertie?”

“Not now; I’d not have him awakened for the world; and I assure you the turning of a straw seems to do it. You shall see him this evening: he is always awake and restless then.”

Calling for his bag at the station, Dr. Knox went on to Rose Villa. They were at tea. The children rose up with a shout: his step-mother looked as though she could not believe her eyesight.

“Why, Arnold! Have you come home to stay?”

“Only for a day or two,” he answered. “I thought I should surprise you, but I had not time to write.”

Shaking hands with her, kissing the children, he turned to some one else, who was seated at the tea-table and had not stirred. His hand was already out, when she turned her head, and he drew back his hand and himself together.

“Miss Mack, my new governess,” spoke Mrs. Knox.

“I beg your pardon,” said Dr. Knox to Miss Mack, who turned out to be a young person in green, with stout legs and slippers down at heel. “I thought it was Miss Carey,” he added to his step-mother. “Where is Miss Carey?”

Which of the company, Miss Mack excepted, talked the fastest, and which the loudest, could not have been decided though a thousand-pound wager rested on it. It was a dreadful tale to tell. Janet Carey had turned out to be a thief; Janet Carey had gone out of her mind nearly with fever and fear when she knew she was to be taken to prison and tried: tried for stealing the money; and Janet’s aunt had come down and carried her away out of the reach of the policemen. Dr. Knox gazed and listened, and felt his blood turning cold with righteous horror.

“Be silent,” he sternly said. “There must have been some strange mistake. Miss Carey was good and upright as the day.”

“She stole my fifty pounds,” said Mrs. Knox.

“What?”

“She stole my fifty-pound note. It was the one you sent me, Arnold.”

His face reddened a little. “That note? Well, I do not know the circumstances that led you to accuse Miss Carey; but I know they were mistaken ones. I will answer for Janet Carey with my life.”

“She took that note; it could not have gone in any other manner,” steadily persisted Mrs. Knox. “You’ll say so yourself, Arnold, when you know all. The commotion it has caused in the place, and the worry it has caused me are beyond everything. Every day some tradesman or other comes here to ask whether the money has been replaced—for of course they know I can’t pay them under such a loss, until it is; and I must say they have behaved very well. I never liked Janet Carey. Deceitful minx!”

With so many talking together, Dr. Knox did not gather a very clear account of the details. Mrs. Knox mixed up surmises with facts in a manner to render the whole incomprehensible. He said no more then. Later, Mrs. Knox saw that he was preparing to go out. She resented it.

“I think, Arnold, you might have passed this one evening at home: I want to have a talk with you about money matters. What I am to do is more than I know, unless Janet Carey or her friends can be made to return the money.”

“I am going down to Tamlyn’s, to see Bertie.”

Dr. Knox let himself out at the street-door, and was walking down the garden-path, when he found somebody come flying past. It was Sally the housemaid, on her way to open the gate for him. Such an act of attention was unusual and quite unnecessary; the doctor thanked her, but told her she need not have taken the trouble.

“I—I thought I’d like to ask you, sir, how that—that poor Miss Carey is,” said Sally, in a whisper, as she held the gate back, and her breath was so short as to hinder her words. “It was London she was took to, sir; and, as you live in the same town, I’ve wondered whether you might not have come across her.”

“London is a large place,” observed Dr. Knox. “I did not even know Miss Carey was there.”

“It was a dreadful thing, sir, poor young lady. Everybody so harsh, too, over it. And I—I—I can’t believe but she was innocent.”

“It is simply an insult on Miss Carey to suppose otherwise,” said Dr. Knox. “Are you well, Sally? What’s the matter with your breath?”

“Oh, it’s nothing but a stitch that takes me, thank you, sir,” returned Sally, as she shut the gate after him and flew back again.

But Dr. Knox saw it was no “stitch” that had stopped Sally’s breath and checked her utterance, but genuine agitation. It set him thinking.

No longer any sitting up for poor Bertie Tamlyn in this world! It was about eight o’clock when Dr. Knox entered the sick-chamber. Bertie lay in bed; his arms thrown outside the counterpane beside him, as though they were too warm. The fire gave out its heat; two lamps were burning, one on the mantelpiece, one on the drawers at the far end of the room. Bertie had always liked a great deal of light, and he liked it still. Miss Tamlyn met Dr. Knox at the door, and silently shook hands with him.

Bertie’s wide-open eyes turned to look, and the doctor approached the bed; but he halted for one imperceptible moment in his course. When Mr. Tamlyn had said Bertie was dying, Arnold Knox had assumed it to mean, not that he was actually dying at that present time, but that he would not recover! But as he gazed at Bertie now in the bright light, he saw something in the face that his experienced medical eye could not mistake.

He took the wasted, fevered hand in his, and laid his soothing fingers on the damp brow. Miss Tamlyn went away for a minute’s respite from the sick-room.

“Bertie, my boy!”

“Why didn’t you come before, Arnold?” was the low, weak answer; and the breath was laboured and the voice down nowhere. “I have wanted you. Aunt Bessy would not write; and papa thought you would not care to come down from London, just for me.”

“But I would, Bertie—had I known you were as ill as this.”

Bertie’s hands were restless. The white quilt had knots in it as big as peas, and he was picking at them. Dr. Knox sat down by the low bed.

“Do you think I am dying?” suddenly asked Bertie.

It took the doctor by surprise. One does not always know how to answer such home questions.

“I’ll tell you more about it when I’ve seen you by daylight, Bertie. Are you in any pain?”

“Not a bit now: that’s gone. But I’m weak, and I can’t stir about in bed, and—and—they all look at me so. This morning papa and Shuttleworth brought in Dr. Green. Any way, you must know that I shall not get to be as well as I used to be.”

“What with one ailment and another, with care, and pain, and sorrow, and wrong, it seems to me, Bertie, that very few of us are well for long together. There’s always something in this world: it is only when we go to the next that we can hope for rest and peace.”

Bertie lifted his restless hands and caught one of Dr. Knox’s between them. He had a yearning, imploring look that quite pained the doctor.

“I want you to forgive me, Arnold,” he said, the tears running down. “When I remember how wicked I was, my heart just faints with shame. Calling all of you hideous names!—returning bitter words for kind ones. When we are going to die the past comes back to us. Such a little while it seems to have been now, Arnold! Why, if I had endured ten times as much pain, it would be over now. You were all so gentle and patient with me, and I never cared what trouble I gave, or what ill words I returned. And now the time is gone! Arnold, I want you to forgive me.”

“My dear boy, there’s nothing to forgive. If you think there is, why then I forgive you with all my heart.”

“Will God ever forgive me, do you think?”

“Oh, my boy, yes,” said the doctor, in a husky tone. “If we, poor sinful mortals, can forgive one another, how much more readily will He forgive—the good Father in heaven of us all!”

Bertie sighed. “It would have been so easy for me to have tried for a little patience! Instead of that, I took pleasure in being cross and obstinate and wicked! If the time would but come over again! Arnold, do you think we shall be able to do one another good in the next world?—or will the opportunity be lost with this?”

“Ah, Bertie, I cannot tell,” said Dr. Knox. “Sometimes I think that just because so few of us make use of our opportunities here, God will, perhaps, give us a chance once again. I have not been at very many death-beds yet, but of some of those the recollection of opportunities wasted has made the chief sting. It is only when life is closing that we see what we might have been, what we might have done.”

“Perhaps He’ll remember what my pain has been, Arnold, and how hard it was to bear. I was not like other boys. They can run, and climb, and leap, and ride on horseback, and do anything. When I’ve gone out, it has been in a hand-carriage, you know; and I’ve had to lie and lie on the sofa, and just look up at the blue sky, or on the street that tired me so: or else in bed, where it was worse, and always hot. I hope He will recollect how hard it was for me.”

“He saw how hard it was for you at the time, Bertie; saw it always.”

“And Jesus Christ forgave all who went to Him, you know, Arnold; every one; just for the asking.”

“Why, yes, of course He did. As He does now.”

Mr. Tamlyn came into the room presently: he had been out to a patient. Seeing that Bertie was half asleep, he and Dr. Knox stood talking together on the hearthrug.

“What’s that?” cried the surgeon, suddenly catching sight of the movement of the restless fingers picking at the counterpane.

Dr. Knox did not answer.

“A trick he always had,” said the surgeon, breaking the silence, and trying to make believe to cheat himself still. “The maids say he wears out all his quilts.”

Bertie opened his eyes. “Is that you, papa? Is tea over?”

“Why, yes, my boy; two or three hours ago,” said the father, going forward. “Why? Do you wish for some tea?”

“Oh, I—I thought Arnold would have liked some.”

He closed his eyes again directly. Dr. Knox took leave in silence, promising to be there again in the morning. As he was passing the dining-room downstairs, he saw Mr. Shuttleworth, who had just looked in. They shook hands, began to chat, and Dr. Knox sat down.

“I hear you do not like Lefford,” he said.

“I don’t dislike Lefford: it’s a pretty and healthy place,” was Mr. Shuttleworth’s answer. “What I dislike is my position in it as Tamlyn’s partner. The practice won’t do for me.”

“A doubt lay on my mind whether it would suit you when you came down to make the engagement,” said Dr. Knox. “Parish work is not to every one’s taste. And there’s a great deal of practice besides. But the returns from that must be good.”

“I wouldn’t stay in it if it were worth a million a-year,” cried Mr. Shuttleworth. “Dockett takes the parish; I make him; but he is not up to much yet, and of course I feel that I am responsible. As to the town practice, why, I assure you nearly all of it has lain on me. Tamlyn, poor fellow, can think of nothing but his boy.”

“He will not have him here long to think of, I fear.”

“Not very long; no. I hear, doctor, he is going to offer a partnership to you.”

“He has said something about it. I shall take it, if he does. Lefford is my native place, and I would rather live here than anywhere. Besides, I don’t mind work,” he added, with a smile.

“Ah, you are younger than I am. But I’d advise you, as I have advised Tamlyn, to give up the parish. For goodness’ sake do, Knox. Tamlyn says that at one time he had not much else but the parish, but it’s different now. Your father had all the better practice then.”

“Shall you set up elsewhere?”

“Not at present,” said Mr. Shuttleworth. “We—I—perhaps you have heard, though—that I and Bessy are going to make a match of it? We shall travel for a few months, or so, and then come home and pitch our tent in some pleasant sea-side place. If a little easy practice drops in to me there, well and good: if not, we can do without it. Stay and smoke a cigar with me?”

Arnold looked at his watch, and sat down again. He wanted to ask Mr. Shuttleworth about Miss Carey’s illness.

“The cause of her illness was the loss of that bank-note,” said the surgeon. “They accused her of stealing it, and wanted to give her into custody. A little more, and she’d have had brain-fever. She was a timid, inexperienced girl, and the fright gave her system a shock.”

“Miss Carey would no more steal a bank-note than you or I would steal one, Shuttleworth.”

“Not she. I told Mrs. Knox so: but she scoffed at me.”

“That Miss Carey is innocent as the day, that she is an upright, gentle, Christian girl, I will stake my life upon,” said Dr. Knox. “How the note can have gone is another matter.”

“Are you at all interested in finding it out?” questioned Mr. Shuttleworth.

“Certainly I am. Every one ought to be, I think.”

The surgeon took his cigar from his mouth. “I’ll tell you my opinion, if you care to know it,” he said. “The note was burnt.”

“Burnt!”

“Well, it is the most likely solution of the matter that I can come to. Either burnt, or else was blown away.”

“But why do you say this?” questioned Dr. Knox.

“It was a particularly windy day. The glass-doors of the room were left open while the house ran about in a fright, attending to the child, young Dick. A flimsy bit of bank-paper, lying on the table, would get blown about like a feather in a gale. Whether it got into the fire, caught by the current of the chimney, or whether it sailed out-of-doors and disappeared in the air, is a question I can’t undertake to solve. Rely upon it, Knox, it was one of the two: and I should bet upon the fire.”

It was just the clue Dr. Knox had been wishing for. But he did not think the whole fault lay with the wind: he had another idea.

Lefford had a shock in the morning. Bertie Tamlyn was dead. The news came to Dr. Knox in a note from Mr. Tamlyn, which was delivered whilst he was dressing. “You will stay for the funeral, Arnold,” were the concluding words. And as Dr. Knox wanted to be at home a little longer on his own account, he wrote to London to say that business was temporarily detaining him. He then went to see what he could do for Mr. Tamlyn, and got back to Rose Villa for dinner.

Watching for an opportunity—which did not occur until late in the afternoon—Dr. Knox startled the servants by walking into the kitchen, and sitting down. Mrs. Knox had gone off in the pony-chaise; the children were out with the new governess. The kitchen and the servants were alike smartened-up for the rest of the day. Eliza, the cook, was making a new pudding-cloth; Sally was ironing.

“I wish to ask you both a few questions,” said Dr. Knox, taking out his note-book and pencil. “It is not possible that Miss Carey can be allowed to lie under the disgraceful accusation that was brought against her, and I am about to try and discover what became of the bank-note. Mrs. Knox was not in the house at the time, and therefore cannot give me the details.”

Eliza, who had risen and stood, work in hand, simply stared at the doctor in surprise. Sally dropped her iron on the blanket.

“We didn’t take the note, sir,” said Eliza, after a pause. “We’d not do such a thing.”

“I’m sure I didn’t; I’d burn my hands off first,” broke in Sally, with a burst of tears.

“Of course you would not,” returned Dr. Knox in a pleasant tone. “The children would not. Mrs. Knox would not. But as the note undoubtedly disappeared, and without hands, we must try and discover where the mystery lies and how it went. I dare say you would like Miss Carey to be cleared.”

“Miss Carey was a downright nice young lady,” pronounced the cook. “Quite another sort from this one we’ve got now.”

“Well, give me all the particulars as correctly as you can remember,” said the doctor. “We may get some notion or other out of them.”

Eliza plunged into the narration. She was fond of talking. Sally stood over her ironing, sniffing and sighing. Dr. Knox listened.

“Mrs. Knox left the note on the table—which was much strewed with papers—when she went out with Lady Jenkins, and Miss Carey took her place at the accounts,” repeated Dr. Knox, summing up the profuse history in a few concise words. “While——”

“And Miss Carey declared, sir, that she never saw the note; never noticed it lying there at all,” came Eliza’s interruption.

“Yes, just so. While Miss Carey was at the table, the alarm came that Master Dick had fallen out of the tree, and she ran to him——”

“And a fine fright that fall put us into, sir! We thought he was dead. Jim went galloping off for the doctor, and me and Sally and Miss Carey stayed bathing his head on that there very ironing-board, a-trying to find out what the damage was.”

“And the children: where were they?”

“All round us here in the kitchen, sir, sobbing and staring.”

“Meanwhile the garden-room was deserted. No one went into it, as far as you know.”

“Nobody at all, sir. When Sally ran in to look at the fire, she found it had gone clean out. The doctor had been there then, and Master Richard was in bed. A fine pickle Sally found the room in, with the scraps of paper, and that, blown about the floor. The glass-doors was standing stark staring open to the wind.”

“And, I presume, you gathered up some of these scraps of paper, and lighted the fire with them, Sally?”

Dr. Knox did not appear to look at Sally as he spoke, but he saw and noted every movement. He saw that her hand shook so that she could scarcely hold the iron.

“Has it never struck you, Sally, that you might have put the bank-note into the grate with these scraps of paper, and burnt it?” he continued. “Innocently, of course. That is how I think the note must have disappeared. Had the wind taken it into the garden, it would most probably have been found.”

Sally flung her apron over her face and herself on to a chair, and burst into a howl. Eliza looked at her.

“If you think there is a probability that this was the case, Sally, you must say so,” continued Dr. Knox. “You will never be blamed, except for not having spoken.”

“’Twas only yesterday I asked Sally whether she didn’t think this was the way it might have been,” said the cook in a low tone to Dr. Knox. “She have seemed so put out, sir, for a week past.”

“I vow to goodness that I never knew I did it,” sobbed Sally. “All the while the bother was about, and Miss Carey, poor young lady, was off her head, it never once struck me. What Eliza and me thought was, that some tramps must have come round the side of the house and got in at the open glass-doors, and stole it. The night after Miss Carey left with her aunt, I was thinking about her as I lay in bed, and wondering whether the mistress would send the police after her or not, when all of a sudden the thought flashed across me that it might have gone into the fire with the other pieces of paper. Oh mercy, I wish I was somewhere!”

“What became of the ashes out of the grate?—the cinders?” asked Dr. Knox.

“They’re all in the ash-place, sir, waiting till the garden’s ready for them,” sobbed Sally.

With as little delay as possible, Dr. Knox had the cinders carefully sifted and examined, when the traces of what had once undoubtedly been a bank-note were discovered. The greater portion of the note had been reduced to tinder, but a small part of it remained, enough to show what it had been, and—by singular good fortune—its number. It must have fallen out of the grate partly consumed, while the fire was lighting up, and been swept underneath by Sally with other remnants, where it had lain quietly until morning and been taken away with the ashes.

The traces gathered carefully into a small box and sealed up, Dr. Knox went into the presence of his step-mother.

“I think,” he said, just showing the box as it lay in his hand, “that this proof will be accepted by the Bank of England; in that case they will make good the money to me. One question, mother, I wish to ask you: how could you possibly suspect Miss Carey?”

“There was no one else for me to suspect,” replied Mrs. Knox in fretful tones; for she did not at all like this turn in the affair.

“Did you really suspect her?”

“Why, of course I did. How can you ask such foolish questions?”

“It was a great mistake in any case to take it up as you did. I am not alluding to the suspicion now; but to your harsh and cruel treatment.”

“Just mind your own business, Arnold. It’s nothing to you.”

“For my own part, I regard it as a matter that we must ever look back upon with shame.”

“There, that’s enough,” said Mrs. Knox. “The thing is done with, and it cannot be recalled. Janet Carey won’t die of it.”

Dr. Knox went about Lefford with the box in his hand, making things right. He called in at the police-station; he caused a minute account to be put in the Lefford News; he related the details to his private friends. Not once did he allude to Janet Carey, or mention her name: it was as though he would proudly ignore the stigma cast on her and assume that the world did the same. The world did: but it gave some hard words to Mrs. Knox.

Mr. Tamlyn had not much sympathy for wonders of any kind just then. Poor Bertie, lying cold and still in the chamber above, took up all his thoughts and his grief. Arnold spent a good deal of time with him, and took his round of patients.

It was the night before the funeral, and they were sitting together at twilight in the dining-room. Dr. Knox was looking through the large window at the fountain in the middle of the grass-plat: Mr. Tamlyn had his face buried; he had not looked up for the last half-hour.

“When is the very earliest time that you can come, Arnold?” he began abruptly.

“As soon as ever they will release me in London. Perhaps that will be in a month; perhaps not until the end of June, when the six months will be up.”

Mr. Tamlyn groaned. “I want you at once, Arnold. You are all I have now.”

“Shuttleworth must stay until I come.”

“Shuttleworth’s not you. You must live with me, Arnold?”