“Where is my brother and the ladies?” said the amazed doctor.
“They all went off to the ’otel, sir, as soon as Mr. Rider came downstairs,” said Mary, complacently. “I assured Miss as it was the best thing she could do, sir, for that I was ’most sure you’d never have the children here—as to be sure there wasn’t no room neither,” said the doctor’s factotum. “As soon as Mr. Frederick came down, she called a cab, did Miss, and took ’em both away.”
“Oh! so they’re gone, are they?” said the doctor.
“Hours and hours ago,” answered Mary; “dinner’ll be up in two minutes. But I wouldn’t say much for the potatoes, sir. When a gentleman’s irreg’lar, it’s hard laws on the poor servants—nothink will keep, going on for two hours, and not take no harm; but all’s quiet and comfortable in your room.”
And with this assurance, which she evidently thought a very grateful one, Mary went off to get the doctor’s dinner. He walked to the end of the room, and then back again, with solemnity—then threw himself into that easy-chair. “Blessed riddance!” said the doctor; but somehow he looked glum, wonderfully glum. There was no accounting for those blank looks of his; he who had been condoling with himself over the exciting scene he expected, so uncomfortable a conclusion to a long day’s labour, how was it he did not look relieved when that scene was spared him? To tell the truth, when one has been expecting something to happen, of whatever description, and has been preparing one’s courage, one’s temper, one’s fortitude, in anticipatory rehearsals—when one has placed one’s self in the attitude of a martyr, and prepared to meet with fiery trials—it is mortifying, to say the least, when one finds all the necessities of the case disappear, and the mildest calm replace that tragical anticipation: the quiet falls blank upon the excited fancy. Of course Dr. Rider was relieved; but it was with something mightily like disappointment that he leant back in his chair and knitted his brows at the opposite wall. Not for the world would he have acknowledged himself to be disappointed; but the calm was wonderfully monotonous after all those expectations. He was never so bored and sick of a night by himself. He tried to read, but reading did not occupy his mind. He grew furious over his charred chops and sodden potatoes. As for the tea Mary brought, he would have gladly pitched it at her by way of diversifying that blank evening with an incident. The contrast between what he had looked for and what he had, was wonderful. How delicious this stillness should have been, this consciousness of having his house to himself, and nobody to interrupt his brief repose! But somehow it appears that human nature takes best with not having its wishes granted. It is indescribable how Dr. Rider yawned—how dull he found his newspaper—how few books worth reading there were in the house—how slow the minutes ran on. If somebody had chosen to be ill that night, of all nights the best for such a purpose, the doctor would not have objected to such an interruption. Failing that, he went to bed early, dreadfully tired of his own society. Such were the wonderful results of that invasion so much dreaded, and that retreat so much hoped for. Perhaps his own society had never in his life been so distasteful to him before.
III
Next day Dr. Rider audibly congratulated himself at breakfast upon having once more his house to himself—audibly, as if it were really necessary to give utterance to the thought before he could quite feel its force. A week before, if Fred had departed, however summarily, there can be no doubt that his brother’s feelings of relief and comfort would have been unfeigned; now, however, he began to think the matter over, and to justify to himself his extraordinary sense of disappointment. As he poured out his own coffee with a sober face, his eye rested upon that easy-chair which had been brought into such prominence in the history of the last two days. He kept looking at it as he sipped that gloomy coffee. Fred had faded from the great chair; his big image threw no shadow upon it. There sat a little fairy queen, tiny as Titania, but dark as an elf of the East, putting up those two shapely tiny hands, brown and beautiful, to push aside the flood of hair, which certainly would have veiled her little figure all over, the doctor thought, had it been let down. Wonderful little sprite! She, no doubt, had dragged her plaintive sister over the seas—she it was that had forced her way into Edward Rider’s house; taken her position in it, ousted the doctor; and she doubtless it was who
