The Small House at Allington

know I never shall do so. I have made up my mind about it clearly and with an absolute certainty." "Lily, Lily, Lily! pray do not say so." "But I do say it. And yet I have not been very mopish and melancholy; have I, Bell? I do think I deserve some little credit, and yet, I declare, you won't allow me the least privilege in the world." "What privilege would you wish me to give you?" "To talk about Dr. Crofts." "Lily, you are a wicked, wicked tyrant." And Bell leaned over her, and fell upon her, and kissed her, hiding her own face in the gloom of the evening. After that it came to be an accepted understanding between them that Bell was not altogether indifferent to Dr. Crofts. "You heard what he said, my darling," Mrs. Dale said the next day, as the three were in the room together after Dr. Crofts was gone. Mrs. Dale was standing on one side of the bed, and Bell on the other, while Lily was scolding them both. "You can get up for an hour or two to-morrow, but he thinks you had better not go out of the room." "What would be the good of that, mamma? I am so tired of looking always at the same paper. It is such a tiresome paper. It makes one count the pattern over and over again. I wonder how you ever can live here." "I've got used to it, you see." "I never can get used to that sort of thing; but go on counting, and counting, and counting. I'll tell you what I should like; and I'm sure it would be the best thing, too." "And what would you like?" said Bell. "Just to get up at nine o'clock to-morrow, and go to church as though nothing had happened. Then, when Dr. Crofts came in the evening, you would tell him I was down at the school." "I wouldn't quite advise that," said Mrs. Dale. "It would give him such a delightful start. And when he found I didn't die immediately, as of course I ought to do according to rule, he would be so disgusted." "It would be very ungrateful, to say the least of it," said Bell. "No, it wouldn't, a bit. He needn't come, unless he likes it. And I don't believe he comes to see me at all. It's all very well, mamma, your looking in that way; but I'm sure it's true. And I'll tell you what I'll do, I'll pretend to be bad again, otherwise the poor man will be robbed of his only happiness." "I suppose we must allow her to say what she likes till she gets well," said Mrs. Dale, laughing. It was now nearly dark, and Mrs. Dale did not see that Bell's hand had crept under the bed-clothes, and taken hold of that of her sister. "It's true, mamma," continued Lily, "and I defy her to deny it. I would forgive him for keeping me in bed if he would only make her fall in love with him." "She has made a bargain, mamma," said Bell, "that she is to say whatever she likes till she gets well." "I am to say whatever I like always; that was the bargain, and I mean to stand to it." On the following Sunday Lily did get up, but did not leave her mother's bedroom. There she was, seated in that half-dignified and half-luxurious state which belongs to the first getting up of an invalid, when Dr. Crofts called. There she had eaten her tiny bit of roast mutton, and had called her mother a stingy old creature, because she would not permit another morsel; and there she had drunk her half glass of port wine, pretending that it was very bad, and twice worse than the doctor's physic; and there, Sunday though it was, she had fully enjoyed the last hour of daylight, reading that exquisite new novel which had just completed itself, amidst the jarring criticisms of the youth and age of the reading public. "I am quite sure she was right in accepting him, Bell," she said, putting down the book as the light was fading, and beginning to praise the story. "It was a matter of course," said Bell. "It always is right in the novels. That's why I don't like them. They are too sweet." "That's why I do like them, because they are so sweet. A sermon is not to tell you what you are, but what you ought to be, and a novel should tell you not what you are to get, but what you'd like to get." "If so, then, I'd go back to the old school, and have the heroine really a heroine, walking all the way up from Edinburgh to London, and falling among thieves; or else nursing a wounded hero, and describing the battle from the window. We've got tired of that; or else the people who write can't do it now-a-days. But if we are to have real life, let it be real." "No, Bell, no!" said Lily. "Real life sometimes is so painful." Then her sister, in a moment, was down on the floor at her feet, kissing her hand and caressing her knees, and praying that the wound might be healed. On that morning Lily had succeeded in inducing her sister to tell her all that had been said by Dr. Crofts. All that had been said by herself also, Bell had intended to tell; but when she came to this part of the story, her account was very lame. "I don't think I said anything," she said. "But silence always gives consent. He'll know that," Lily had rejoined. "No, he will not; my silence didn't give any consent; I'm sure of that. And he didn't think that it did." "But you didn't mean to refuse him?" "I think I did. I don't think I knew what I meant; and it was safer, therefore, to look no, than to look yes. If I didn't say it, I'm sure I looked it." "But you wouldn't refuse him now?" asked Lily. "I don't know," said Bell. "It seems as though I should want years to make up my mind; and he won't ask me again." Bell was still at her sister's feet, caressing them, and praying with all her heart that that wound might be healed in due time, when Mrs. Dale came in and announced the doctor's daily visit. "Then I'll go," said Bell. "Indeed you won't," said Lily. "He's coming simply to make a morning call, and nobody need run away. Now, Dr. Crofts, you need not come and stand over me with your watch, for I won't let you touch my hand except to shake hands with me;" and then she held her hand out to him. "And all you'll know of my tongue you'll learn from the sound." "I don't care in the least for your tongue." "I dare say not, and yet you may some of these days. I can speak out, if I like it; can't I, mamma?" "I should think Dr. Crofts knows that by this time, my dear." "I don't know. There are some things gentlemen are very slow to learn. But you must sit down, Dr. Crofts, and make yourself comfortable and polite; for you must understand that you are not master here any longer. I am out of bed now, and your reign is over." "That's the gratitude of the world, all through," said Mrs. Dale. "Who is ever grateful to a doctor? He only cures you that he may triumph over some other doctor, and declare, as he goes by Dr. Gruffen's door, 'There, had she called you in, she'd have been dead before now; or else would have been ill for twelve months.' Don't you jump for joy when Dr. Gruffen's patients die?" "Of course I do--out in the market-place, so that everybody shall see me," said the doctor. "Lily, how can you say such shocking things?" said her sister. Then the doctor did sit down, and they were all very cosy together over the fire, talking about things which were not medical, or only half medical in their appliance. By degrees the conversation came round to Mrs. Eames and to John Eames. Two or three days since, Crofts had told Mrs. Dale of that affair at the railway station, of which up to that time she had heard nothing. Mrs. Dale, when she was assured that young Eames had given Crosbie a tremendous thrashing--the tidings of the affair which had got themselves substantiated at Guestwick so described the nature of the encounter--could not withhold some meed of applause. "Dear boy!" she said, almost involuntarily. "Dear boy! it came from the honestness of his heart!" And then she gave special injunctions to the doctor--injunctions which were surely unnecessary--that no word of the matter should be whispered before Lily. "I was at the manor, yesterday," said the doctor, "and the earl would talk about nothing but Master Johnny. He says he's the finest fellow going." Whereupon Mrs. Dale touched him with her foot, fearing that the conversation might be led away in the direction of Johnny's prowess. "I am so glad," said Lily. "I always knew that they'd find John out at last." "And Lady Julia is just as fond of him," said the doctor. "Dear me!" said Lily. "Suppose they were to make up a match!" "Lily, how can you be so absurd?" "Let me see; what relation would he be to us? He would certainly be Bernard's uncle, and uncle Christopher's half brother-in-law. Wouldn't it be odd?" "It would rather," said Mrs. Dale. "I hope he'll be civil to Bernard. Don't you, Bell? Is he to give up the Income-tax Office, Dr. Crofts?" "I didn't hear that that was settled yet." And so they went on talking about John Eames. "Joking apart," said Lily, "I am very glad that Lord De Guest has taken him by the hand. Not that I think an earl is better than anybody else, but because it shows that people are beginning to understand that he has got something in him. I always said that they who laughed at John would see him hold up his head yet." All which words sank deep into Mrs. Dale's mind. If only, in some coming time, her pet might be taught to love this new young hero! But then would not that last heroic deed of his militate most strongly against any possibility of such love! "And now I may as well be going," said the doctor, rising from his chair. At this time Bell had left the room, but Mrs. Dale was still there. "You need not be in such a hurry, especially this evening," said Lily. "Why especially this evening?" "Because it will be the last. Sit down again, Dr. Crofts. I've got a little speech to make to you. I've been preparing it all the morning, and you must give me an opportunity of speaking it." "I'll come the day after to-morrow, and I'll hear it then." "But I choose, sir, that you should hear it now. Am I not to be obeyed when I first get up on to my own throne? Dear, dear Dr. Crofts, how am I to thank you for all that you have done?" "How are any of us to thank him?" said Mrs. Dale. "I hate thanks," said the doctor. "One kind glance of the eye is worth them all, and I've had many such in this house." "You have our hearts' love, at any rate," said Mrs. Dale. "God bless you all!" said he, as he prepared to go. "But I haven't made my speech yet," said Lily. "And to tell the truth, mamma, you must go away, or I shall never be able to make it. It's very improper, is it not, turning you out, but it shall only take three minutes." Then Mrs. Dale, with some little joking word, left the room; but, as she left it, her mind was hardly at ease. Ought she to have gone, leaving it to Lily's discretion to say what words she might think fit to Dr. Crofts? Hitherto she had never doubted her daughters--not even their discretion; and therefore it had been natural to her to go when she was bidden. But as she went downstairs she had her doubts whether she was right or no. "Dr. Crofts," said Lily, as soon as they were alone. "Sit down there, close to me. I want to ask you a question. What was it you said to Bell when you were alone with her the other evening in the parlour?" The doctor sat for a moment without answering, and Lily, who was watching him closely, could see by the light of the fire that he had been startled--had almost shuddered as the question was asked him. "What did I say to her?" and he repeated her words in a very low voice. "I asked her if she could love me, and be my wife." "And what answer did she make to you?" "What answer did she make? She simply refused me." "No, no, no; don't believe her, Dr. Crofts. It was not so;--I think