King of the Castle

“To show that you have no confidence in your medical man.”

“Oh, no, no; but Mary and I might be of some use.”

“And of none at all to-morrow, my dears. You must both go to bed, and be ready to relieve me.”

“But is there anything else I can do to help you?”

“Yes; what I say – go to bed at once.”

Claude hesitated a few moments, and then walked quickly to the side of the mattress, knelt down, kissed her father lovingly, and then rose.

“Come, Mary,” she said. “And you will ring the upstairs bell if there’s the slightest need?”

“Of course, of course. There, good-night; I shall ring punctually at two.”

He shook hands, and the two girls left the room unwillingly, and proceeded slowly upstairs.

“Well lie down in your room, Mary,” said Claude; “it is so much nearer the bell. Do you know, I feel so dreadfully low-spirited? It is as if a terrible shadow had come over the place, and – don’t laugh at me – it seemed to grow darker when Doctor Asher came into the room.”

“What nonsense! Because he is all in black.”

“Do you think he is to be trusted, Mary?”

“I don’t know. I don’t like him, and I never did. He is so sleek and smooth, and I hate him to call us ‘my dear’ in that nasty, patronising, paternal sort of way.”

“Then let’s sit up.”

“No, no. It would be absurd. I daresay we should feel the same about any other doctor.”

“I do hope he will take great care of poor papa,” sighed Claude; and the door closed after them as they entered their room.

If Doctor Asher was not going to take great care of Norman Gartram, it was very evident that he was going to take very great care of himself, for as soon as he was alone he struck a match, lit the spirit lamp, lifted the lid of the coffee pot, and found that it was still very hot, and then, removing a stopper in the spirit stand, he poured out into a cup a goodly portion of pale brandy.

He had just restored the stopper to the spirit decanter, saying to himself, “Nice, thoughtful little girl!” when Gartram moaned and moved uneasily.

The doctor crossed to him directly, went down on one knee, and felt to see that his patient’s neck was well opened.

“Almost a pity not to have had him undressed,” he said to himself. “What’s the matter with you – uncomfortable? Why, poor old boy,” he continued, with a half laugh, as his hands busily felt round the sick man, “how absurd!”

He had passed a hand through the opening in Gartram’s shirt front, and after a little effort succeeded in unbuckling a cash belt which was round his patient’s waist, drawing the whole out, and noting that on one side there was a pocket stuffed full and hard as he threw the belt carelessly on the table.

“Nice wadge that for a man to lie on. There, old fellow, you’ll be more comfortable now.”

As if to endorse his words, Gartram uttered a deep sigh, and seemed to settle off to sleep.

“Breeches pockets full too, I daresay,” muttered the doctor; “and shouldn’t be surprised if there’s a good, hard bunch of keys somewhere in his coat. Doesn’t trouble him, though.”

He rose, and went back to the tray at the side, filled the already primed coffee cup and carried it to the table, wheeled forward an easy chair, selected a cigar, which he lit, and then threw himself back and sipped his coffee and smoked.

“Yes, sweet little girl Claude,” he thought; “make a man a good wife – good rich wife, and if – no, no, not the slightest chance for me, and I’ll go on as I am, and make the best of it.”

He had another sip.

“Delicious coffee, fine cigar. Worse things than being a doctor. We get as much insight of family matters as the parsons, and are trusted with more secrets.”

He laughed to himself as he lay back.

“Yes, nice little heiress, Claude,” he said again. “Wonder who’ll get her – Christopher the salmon fisher, or our new yachting friend? I think I should back Glyddyr.”

He smoked on, and thought seriously for some time about his other patient, and after a time he emitted a cloud of smoke which he had retained in his mouth, as he turned himself with a jerk from one side of his great easy chair to the other.

“No,” he said, “impossible to have done more. The Royal College of Surgeons couldn’t save him.”

He smoked on in silence, sipping his coffee from time to time, gazing the while at Gartram, upon whom the light shone faintly, just sufficient to show his stern-looking, deeply-marked face.

“Yours is a good head, my dear patient,” he mused. “Well-cut features, and a look of firm determination in your aspect, even when your eyes are closed. You miss something there, for you have keen, piercing eyes, but for all that you look like what you are, a stubborn, determined Englishman, who will have his own way over everything so long as his works will make him go. When they run down, he comes to me for help, and I am helping him. Yes, you were sure to get on and heap up money, and build grand houses, and slap your pocket-book and say: ‘I am a rich man,’ and ‘I laugh at and deride the whole world,’ and so you do, my dear sir, all but the doctor, who, once he has you, has you all his life, and can do what he likes with you. I have you hard, Norman Gartram, and I am licenced; I have you completely under me, and so greatly am I in possession of you, that I could this night say to you die, and you would die; or I could bid you live, and you would live. A simple giving or a simple taking. A movement with the tactus eruditus of a physician, and then the flag would be down, the King of the Castle would be gone, and a new king would reign in the stead – or queen,” he added, with a laugh.

“Ah, you people trust us a great deal, and we in return trust you – a very long time often before we can get paid. Not you, my dear Gartram, you always were a hard cash man. But you people trust us a great deal, and our power is great.

“And ought not to be abused,” he said hastily. “No, of course not. No one ought to abuse those who trust. Capital coffee this,” he added, as he partook of more. “Grand thing to keep a man awake.

“Humph! Tired. Ours is weary work,” and he yawned.

“I believe I should have been a clever fellow,” mused the doctor, “if I had not been so confoundedly lazy. There’s something very interesting in these cases. In yours, for instance, my fine old fellow, it sets one thinking whether I could have treated you differently, and whether I could do anything to prevent the recurrence of these fits.”

He smoked on in silence, and then shook his head.

“No,” he said, half aloud; “if there is a fire burning, and that is kept burning, all that we can do is to keep on smothering it for a time. It is sure to keep on eating its way out. He has a fire in his brain which he insists upon keeping burning, so until he quenches it himself, all I can do is to stop the flames by smothering it over by my medical sods. You must cure yourself, Norman Gartram; I cannot cure you. No, and you cannot cure yourself, for you will go on struggling to make more money that you have no use for, till you die. Poor devil!”

He said the last two words aloud, in a voice full of pitying contempt. Then, after another sip of his coffee, he looked round for a book, drew the lamp close to his right shoulder, and picked up one or two volumes, but only to throw them down again; and he was reaching over for another when his eye fell upon the cash belt with its bulging contents.

“Humph,” he ejaculated, as he turned it over and over, and noted that it had been in service a long time. “Stuffed very full. Notes, I suppose. Old boy hates banking. Wonder how much there is in? Very dishonourable,” he muttered; “extremely so, but he has placed himself in my hands.”

He drew out a pocket-book.

“Wants a new elastic band, my dear Gartram. Out of order. I must prescribe a new band. Let me see; what have we here? Notes – fivers – tens – two fifties. Droll thing that these flimsy looking scraps of paper should represent so much money. More here too – tens, all of them.”

He drew forth from the pockets of the book dirty doubled-up packets of Bank of England notes, and carelessly examined them, refolding them, and returning them to their places.

“What a capital fee I might pay myself,” he said, with an unpleasant little laugh; “and I don’t suppose, old fellow, that you would miss it. Certainly, my dear Gartram, you would be none the worse. Extremely one-sided sometimes,” he said, “to have had the education of a gentleman and run short. Yes, very.”

He returned the last notes to the pocket, and raised a little flap in the inner part.

“Humph! what’s this? An old love letter. No: man’s handwriting: – ‘instructions to my executors.’”

He gave vent to a low whistle, glanced at the sleeping man, then at the door, and back at his patient before laying down the pocket-book, and turning the soiled little envelope over and over.

“Not fastened down,” he muttered. “I wonder what – Oh, no: one can’t do that.”