Florence Barclay - The Mistress of Shenstone

“Yes,” said the doctor, slowly. “The duchess sent me. She was at the War Office this morning when the news came in, inquiring for Ronald Ingram, who has been wounded, and is down with fever. She telephoned for me, and insisted on the telegram being kept back until six o’clock this evening, in order to give me time to get here, and to break the news to you first, if it seemed well.”

Myra gazed at him, wide-eyed. “And you let me say all that, about Michael and myself?”

“Dear lady,” said the doctor, and few had ever heard that deep firm voice, so nearly tremulous, “I could not stop you. But you did not say one word which was not absolutely loving and loyal.”

“How could I have?” queried Myra, her face growing whiter, and her eyes wider and more bright. “I have never had a thought which was not loyal and loving.”

“I know,” said the doctor. “Poor brave heart, – I know.”

Myra took up the telegram, and read it again.

“Killed,” she said; “ killed . I wish I knew how.”

“The duchess is ready to come to you immediately, if you would like to have her,” suggested the doctor.

“No,” said Myra, smiling vaguely. “No; I think not. Not unless dear mamma comes. If that happens we must wire for the duchess, because now – now Michael is away – she is the only person who can cope with mamma. But please not, otherwise; because – well, you see, – she said she could not live up to Michael; and it does not sound funny now.”

“Is there anybody you would wish sent for at once?” inquired the doctor, wondering how much larger and brighter those big grey eyes could grow; and whether any living face had ever been so absolutely colourless.

“Anybody I should wish sent for at once? I don’t know. Oh, yes – there is one person; if she could come. Jane – you know? Jane Dalmain. I always say she is like the bass of a tune; so solid, and satisfactory, and beneath one. Nothing very bad could happen, if Jane were there. But of course this has happened; hasn’t it?”

The doctor sat down.

“I wired to Gleneesh this morning,” he said. “Jane will be here early to-morrow.”

“Then lots of people knew before I did?” said Lady Ingleby.

The doctor did not answer.

She rose, and stood looking down into the fire; her tall graceful figure drawn up to its full height, her back to the doctor, whose watchful eyes never left her for an instant.

Suddenly she looked across to Lord Ingleby’s chair.

“And I believe Peter knew,” she said, in a loud, high-pitched voice. “Good heavens! Peter knew; and refused his food because Michael was dead. And I said he had dyspepsia! Michael, oh Michael! Your wife didn’t know you were dead; but your dog knew! Oh Michael, Michael! Little Peter knew!”

She lifted her arms toward the picture of the big man and the tiny dog.

Then she swayed backward.

The doctor caught her, as she fell.

All through the night Lady Ingleby lay gazing before her, with bright unseeing eyes.

The quiet woman from the Lodge, who had been, before her own marriage, a devoted maid-companion to Lady Ingleby, arrived in speechless sorrow, and helped the doctor tenderly with all there was to do.

But when consciousness returned, and realisation, they were accompanied by no natural expressions of grief; simply a settled stony silence; the white set face; the bright unseeing eyes.

Margaret O’Mara knelt, and wept, and prayed, kissing the folded hands upon the silken quilt. But Lady Ingleby merely smiled vaguely; and once she said: “Hush, my dear Maggie. At last we will be adequate.”

Several times during the night the doctor came, sitting silently beside the bed, with watchful eyes and quiet touch. Myra scarcely noticed him, and again he wondered how much larger the big grey eyes would grow, in the pale setting of that lovely face.

Once he signed to the other watcher to follow him into the corridor. Closing the door, he turned and faced her. He liked this quiet woman, in her simple black merino gown, linen collar and cuffs, and neatly braided hair. There was an air of refinement and gentle self-control about her, which pleased the doctor.

“Mrs. O’Mara,” he said; “she must weep, and she must sleep.”

“She does not weep easily, sir,” replied Margaret O’Mara, “and I have known her to lie widely awake throughout an entire night with less cause for sorrow than this.”

“Ah,” said the doctor; and he looked keenly at the woman from the Lodge. “I wonder what else you have known?” he thought. But he did not voice the conjecture. Deryck Brand rarely asked questions of a third person. His patients never had to find out that his knowledge of them came through the gossip or the breach of confidence of others.

At last he could allow that fixed unseeing gaze no longer. He decided to do what was necessary, with a quiet nod, in response to Margaret O’Mara’s imploring look. He turned back the loose sleeve of the silk nightdress, one firm hand grasped the soft arm beneath it; the other passed over it for a moment with swift skilful pressure. Even Margaret’s anxious eyes saw nothing more; and afterwards Myra often wondered what could have caused that tiny scar upon the whiteness of her arm.

Before long she was quietly asleep. The doctor stood looking down upon her. There was tragedy to him in this perfect loveliness. Now the clear candour of the grey eyes was veiled, the childlike look was no longer there. It was the face of a woman – and of a woman who had lived, and who had suffered.

Watching it, the doctor reviewed the history of those ten years of wedded life; piecing together that which she herself had told him; his own shrewd surmisings; and facts, which were common knowledge.

So much for the past. The present, for a few hours at least, was merciful oblivion. What would the future bring? She had bravely and faithfully put from her all temptation to learn the glory of life, and the completeness of love, from any save from her own husband. And he had failed to teach. Can the deaf teach harmony, or the blind reveal the beauties of blended colour?

But the future held no such limitations. The “garden enclosed” was no longer barred against all others by an owner who ignored its fragrance. The gate would be on the latch, though all unconscious until an eager hand pressed it, that its bolts and bars were gone, and it dare swing open wide.

“Ah,” mused the doctor. “Will the right man pass by? Youth teaches youth; but is there a man amongst us strong enough, and true enough, and pure enough, to teach this woman, nearing thirty, lessons which should have been learned during the golden days of girlhood. Surely somewhere on this earth the One Man walks, and works, and waits, to whom she is to be the One Woman? God send him her way, in the fulness of time.”

And in that very hour – while at last Myra slept, and the doctor watched, and mused, and wondered – in that very hour, under an Eastern sky, a strong man, sick of life, worn and disillusioned, fighting a deadly fever, in the sultry atmosphere of a soldier’s tent, cried out in bitterness of soul: “O God, let me die!” Then added the “never-the-less” which always qualifies a brave soul’s prayer for immunity from pain: “Unless – unless, O God, there be still some work left on this earth which only I can do.”

And the doctor had just said: “Send him her way, O God, in the fulness of time.”

The two prayers reached the Throne of Omniscience together.

Deryck Brand, looking up, saw the quiet eyes of Margaret O’Mara gazing gratefully at him, across the bed. “Thank you,” she whispered.

He smiled. “Never to be done lightly, Mrs. O’Mara,” he said. “Everything else should be tried first. But there are exceptions to the strictest rules, and it is fatal weakness to hesitate when confronted by the exception. Send for me, when she wakes; and, meanwhile, lie down on that couch yourself and have some sleep. You are worn out.”