When you are a happy married woman--when he is farther removed from me than he is even now--remember your ugly, ill-tempered friend, and let me come to you. Enough of this! I have other misgivings that are waiting to be confessed. You know that old nurse of yours intimately--while I only speak from a day or two's experience of her. To my judgment, she is a woman whose fondness for you might be turned into a tigerish fondness, on very small provocation. You write to her constantly. Does she know what you have suffered? Have you told her the truth?"
"Yes."
"Without reserve?"
"Entirely without reserve."
"When that old woman comes to London, Carmina--and sees you, and sees Mrs. Gallilee--don't you think the consequences may be serious? and your position between them something (if you were ten times stronger than you are) that no fortitude can endure?"
Carmina started up on the sofa. She was not able to speak. Miss Minerva gave her time to recover herself--after another look at the clock.
"I am not alarming you for nothing," she proceeded; "I have something hopeful to propose. Your friend Teresa has energies--wild energies. Make a good use of them. She will do anything you ask or her. Take her with you to Canada!"
"Oh, Frances!"
Miss Minerva pointed to the letter on the desk. "Does he tell you when he will be back?"
"No. He feels the importance of completely restoring his health--he is going farther and farther away--he has sent to Quebec for his letters."
"Then there is no fear of your crossing each other on the voyage. Go to Quebec, and wait for him there."
"I should frighten him."
"Not you!"
"What can I say to him?"
"What you must say, if you are weak enough to wait for him here. Do you think his mother will consider his feelings, when he comes back to marry you? I tell you again I am not talking at random. I have thought it all out: I know how you can make your escape, and defy pursuit. You have plenty of money; you have Teresa to take care of you. Go! For your own sake, for his sake, go!"
The clock struck the hour. She rose and removed the handkerchief from her head. "Hush!" she said, "Do I hear the rustling of a dress on the landing below?" She snatched up a bottle of Mr. Null's medicine--as a reason for being in the room. The sound of the rustling dress came nearer and nearer. Mrs. Gallilee (on her way to the schoolroom dinner) opened the door. She instantly understood the purpose which the bottle was intended to answer.
"It is my business to give Carmina her medicine," she said. "Your business is at the schoolroom table."
She took possession of the bottle, and advanced to Carmina. There were two looking-glasses in the room. One, in the usual position, over the fireplace; the other opposite, on the wall behind the sofa. Turning back, before she left the room, Miss Minerva saw Mrs. Gallilee's face, when she and Carmina looked at each other, reflected in the glass.
The girls were waiting for their dinner. Maria received the unpunctual governess with her ready smile, and her appropriate speech. "Dear Miss Minerva, we were really almost getting alarmed about you. Pardon me for noticing it, you look--" She caught the eye of the governess, and stopped confusedly.
"Well?" said Miss Minerva. "How do I look?"
Maria still hesitated. Zo spoke out as usual. "You look as if somebody had frightened you."
CHAPTER XXXVII.
After two days of rain, the weather cleared again.
It was a calm, sunshiny Sunday morning. The flat country round Benjulia's house wore its brightest aspect on that clear autumn day. Even the doctor's gloomy domestic establishment reflected in some degree the change for the better. When he rose that morning, Benjulia presented himself to his household in a character which they were little accustomed to see--the character of a good-humoured master. He astonished his silent servant by attempting to whistle a tune. "If you ever looked cheerful in your life," he said to the man, "look cheerful now. I'm going to take a holiday!"
After working incessantly--never leaving his laboratory; eating at his dreadful table; snatching an hour's rest occasionally on the floor--he had completed a series of experiments, with results on which he could absolutely rely. He had advanced by one step nearer towards solving that occult problem in brain disease, which had thus far baffled the investigations of medical men throughout the civilised world. If his present rate of progress continued, the lapse of another month might add his name to the names that remain immortal among physicians, in the Annals of Discovery.
So completely had his labours absorbed his mind that he only remembered the letters which Mrs. Gallilee had left with him, when he finished his breakfast on Sunday morning. Upon examination, there appeared no allusion in Ovid's correspondence to the mysterious case of illness which he had attended at Montreal. The one method now left, by which Benjulia could relieve the doubt that still troubled him, was to communicate directly with his friend in Canada. He decided to celebrate his holiday by taking a walk; his destination being the central telegraph office in London.
But, before he left the house, his domestic duties claimed attention. He issued his orders to the cook.
At three o'clock he would return to dinner. That day was to witness the celebration of his first regular meat for forty-eight hours past; and he expected the strictest punctuality. The cook--lately engaged--was a vigourous little woman, with fiery hair and a high colour. She, like the man-servant, felt the genial influence of her master's amiability. He looked at her, for the first time since she had entered the house. A twinkling light showed itself furtively in his dreary gray eyes: he took a dusty old hand-screen from the sideboard, and made her a present of it! "There," he said with his dry humour, "don't spoil your complexion before the kitchen fire." The cook possessed a sanguine temperament, and a taste to be honoured and encouraged--the taste for reading novels. She put her own romantic construction on the extraordinary compliment which the doctor's jesting humour had paid to her. As he walked out, grimly smiling and thumping his big stick on the floor, a new idea illuminated her mind. Her master admired her; her master was no ordinary man--it might end in his marrying her.
On his way to the telegraph office, Benjulia left Ovid's letters at Mrs. Gallilee's house.
If he had personally returned them, he would have found the learned lady in no very gracious humour. On the previous day she had discovered Carmina and Miss Minerva engaged in a private conference--without having been able even to guess what the subject under discussion between them might be. They were again together that morning. Maria and Zo had gone to church with their father; Miss Minerva was kept at home by a headache. At that hour, and under those circumstances, there was no plausible pretence which would justify Mrs. Gallilee's interference. She seriously contemplated the sacrifice of a month's salary, and the dismissal of her governess without notice.