Mr. Finch had presented himself (at full length) to Herr Grosse. And Jicks was established on a stool in a corner: devouring a rampant horse, carved in bilious-yellow German gingerbread, with a voracious relish wonderful and terrible to see.
"Ah, my goot Madame Pratolungo!" said Herr Grosse, stopping on his way to Lucilla to shake hands with me. "Have you made anodder lofely Mayonnaise? I have come on purpose with an empty-stomachs, and a wolf's-appetite in fine order. Look at that little Imps," he went on, pointing to Jicks. "Ach Gott! I believe I am in lofe with her. I have sent all the ways to Germany for gingerbreads for Jick. Aha, you Jick! does it stick in your tooths? Is it nice-clammy-sweet?" He glared benevolently at the child through his spectacles; and tucked my hand sentimentally into the breast of his waistcoat. "Promise me a child like adorable Jick," he said solemnly, "I will marry the first wife you bring me--nice womans, nasty womans, I don't care which. Soh! there is my domestic sentiments laid bare before you. Enough of that. Now for my pretty-Feench! Come-begin-begin!"
He crossed the room to Lucilla, and called to Nugent to follow him.
"Open the shutters," he said. "Light-light-light, and plenty of him, for my lofely Feench!"
Nugent opened the shutters, beginning with the lower window, and ending with the window at which Lucilla was sitting. Acting on this plan, he had only to wait where he was, to place himself close by her--to be the first object she saw. He did it. The villain did it. I stepped forward, determined to interfere--and stopped, not knowing what to say or do. I could have beaten my own stupid brains out against the wall. There stood Nugent right before her, as the surgeon turned his patient towards the window. And not the ghost of an idea came to me!
The German stretched out his hairy hands, and took hold of the knot of the bandage to undo it.
Lucilla trembled from head to foot.
Herr Grosse hesitated--looked at her--let go of the bandage-and lifting one of her hands, laid his fingers on her pulse.
In the moment of silence that followed, I had one of my inspirations. The missing idea turned up in my brains at last.
"Soh!" cried Grosse, dropping her hand with a sudden outbreak of annoyance and surprise. Who has been frightening my pretty Feench? Why these cold trembles? these sinking pulses? Some of you tell me--what does it mean?"
Here was my opportunity! I tried my idea on the spot.
"It means," I said, "that there are too many people in this room. We confuse her, and frighten her. Take her into her bedroom, Herr Grosse; and only let the rest of us in, when you think right--one at a time."
Our excellent surgeon instantly seized on my idea, and made it his own.
"You are a phenix among womens," he said, paternally patting me on the shoulder. "Which is most perfectest, your advice or your Mayonnaise, I am at a loss to know." He turned to Lucilla, and raised her gently from her chair. "Come into your own rooms with me, my poor little Feench. I shall see if I dare take off your bandages to-day."
Lucilla clasped her hands entreatingly.
"You promised!" she said. "Oh, Herr Grosse, you promised to let me use my eyes to-day!"
"Answer me this!" retorted the German. "Did I know, when I promised, that I should find you all shaky-pale, as white as my shirts when he comes back from the wash?"
"I am quite myself again," she pleaded faintly. "I am quite fit to have the bandage taken off."
"What! you know better than I do? Which of us is surgeon-optic--you or me? No more of this. Come under my arms! Come into the odder rooms!"
He put her arm in his, and walked with her to the door. There, her variable humour suddenly changed. She rallied on the instant. Her face flushed; her courage came back. To my horror, she snatched her arm away from the surgeon, and refused to leave the room.
"No!" she said. "I am quite composed again; I claim your promise. Examine me here. I must and will have my first look at Oscar in this room."
(I was afraid--literally afraid--to turn my eyes Oscar's way. I glanced at Nugent instead. There was a devilish smile on his face that it nearly drove me mad to see.)
"You must and weel?" repeated Grosse. "Now, mind!" He took out his watch. "I give you one little minutes, to think in. If you don't come with me in that time, you shall find it is I who must and weel. Now!"
"Why do you object to go into your room?" I asked.
"Because I want everybody to see me," she answered. "How many of you are there here?"
"There are five of us. Mr. and Mrs. Finch; Mr. Nugent Dubourg; Oscar, and myself."
"I wish there were five hundred of you, instead of five?" she burst out.
"Why?"
"Because you would see me pick out Oscar from all the rest, the instant the bandage was off my eyes!"
Still holding to her own fatal conviction that the image in her mind of Oscar was the right one! For the second time, though I felt the longing in me to look at him, I shrank from doing it.
Herr Grosse put his watch back in his pocket.
"The minutes is passed," he said. "Will you come into the odder rooms? Will you understand that I cannot properly examine you before all these peoples? Say, my lofely Feench--Yes? or No?"
"No!" she cried obstinately, with a childish stamp of her foot. "I insist on showing everybody that I can pick out Oscar, the moment I open my eyes."
Herr Grosse buttoned his coat, settled his owlish spectacles firmly on his nose, and took up his hat. "Goot morning," he said. "I have nothing more to do with you or your eyes. Cure yourself, you little-spitfire-Feench. I am going back to London."
He opened the door. Even Lucilla was obliged to yield, when the surgeon in attendance on her threatened to throw up the case.
"You brute!" she said indignantly--and took his arm again.
Grosse indulged himself in his diabolical grin. "Wait till you are able to use your eyes, my lofe. Then you will see what a brutes I am!" With those words he took her out.
We were left in the sitting-room, to wait until the surgeon had decided whether he would, or would not, let Lucilla try her sight on that day.
While the others were, in their various ways, all suffering the same uneasy sense of expectation, I was as quiet in my mind as the baby now sleeping in his mother's arms. Thanks to Grosse's resolution to act on the hint that I had given to him, I had now made it impossible--even if the bandage was removed on that day--for Nugent to catch Lucilla's first look when she opened her eyes. Her betrothed husband might certainly, on such a special occasion as this, be admitted into her bed-chamber, in company with her father or with me. But the commonest sense of propriety would dictate the closing of the door on Nugent. In the sitting-room he must wait (if he still persisted in remaining at the rectory) until she was allowed to join him there. I privately resolved, having the control of the matter in my own hands, that this should not happen until Lucilla knew which of the twins was Nugent, and which was Oscar.