The White Virgin

“And pretty dearly I’ve had to pay for it.”

“Yes; a man who wants his bills discounted, and who is known to be stone broke, does have to pay pretty smartly for the risk that is run. But never mind, Jessop, we must try something else. I say, though, that father-in-law of yours is a tartar. You don’t expect to get anything out of him, do you?”

“He must leave his daughter his money.”

“No, he mustn’t. There are plenty of hospitals and charities about. He’ll never let you have a sou.”

“Can’t you find some other cursedly nasty thing to tell me, Wrig,” snarled Jessop. “It’s infernally cowardly of you, that’s what it is. Thank goodness, here’s the engineer.”

“Then now we shall get out of our difficulties or plunge deeper in. Why couldn’t you know something about mining engineering, and so have saved this expense?”

“Mr Wrigley?” said a quiet, solid-looking man, riding up to the office door.

“My name is Wrigley, sir. Are you Mr Benson?”

“Yes; and I came as soon as I could, after I heard from the Woden Mine Company’s secretary. What is the question, gentlemen. Deeper sinking? Troubled with water?”

“No,” said Jessop eagerly. “The lode we have been working has suddenly come to an end in the solid stone.”

“I see. A blind lead,” said the newcomer, dismounting.

“And we want advice as to what is best to do so as to hit again upon the ore,” said Wrigley. “I hear that you stand at the top of the tree in such matters.”

“Very kind of people to say so, sir,” replied the mining engineer. “I do my best. But you used to have a first-class man here – Mr Clive Reed.”

“Yes; but he is dangerously ill, or I should have called him in,” said Wrigley; and Jessop’s countenance cleared. “Well, sir, shall we go down the mine?”

“Better let me go alone, sir,” said the engineer. “I cannot tell you what you want to know in a minute. Perhaps it will take me a week.”

“Take your time, only get to work, and let’s have the full truth, as soon as you can,” said Wrigley, and the engineer nodded, had himself put into communication with the underground foreman, and passed the whole of the following week in the mine. At the end of that time he announced that he was ready with his report, and an adjournment was made to the little office, where Wrigley threw himself into a chair, and Jessop lit a cigar which kept going out, and had to be re-lit again and again, as the expert began to read his carefully written report of his work from day to day.

“My dear sir,” said Wrigley at last, impatiently, “we do not want to hear what time you went into the mine each day, or when you came out, nor yet about how you tested the surroundings of the great lode in different places. Let’s have your final decision, and the position.”

“Very good, gentlemen. I’ll give you both together. The lode ends dead against the barren rock.”

“Which we had already discovered,” said Wrigley sarcastically.

“Through a geological fault,” continued the engineer; “and I have tried hard to make out whether the vein of silver lead, where it was snapped off in some convulsion, or gradual sinking, went down or up.”

“Down or up,” said Jessop, who was listening eagerly, trying with nervous fingers to re-light his cigar from time to time.

“If it went downward, by constant search and sinking – ”

“Money?” interrupted Wrigley.

“I mean shafts, sir,” said the engineer, smiling; “but you may include money; you might perhaps hit upon the lode again; but I am inclined to think, from the conformation of the strata, that the vein was snapped in two and thrust upward.”

“What!” cried Jessop, “then it must be close to the surface?”

“I should say, sir, it was on the surface, and all cleared away hundreds upon hundreds of years ago.”

“But you would sink shafts to try if it had gone down?” said Wrigley, eyeing the engineer keenly.

“No, sir; if it were my case I would be content with the money I had got out of the mine.”

“General burst up, Jessop, my lad,” said Wrigley coolly. “The ‘White Virgin’s’ reputation is smirched, and she is not immaculate after all. Thank you, Mr Benson, I am quite satisfied with your judgment. There, you must have your cheque. There will not be many more for any one.”

Just about the same time, after a week’s trembling in the balance, Clive Reed had taken a turn which filled all at the cottage with hope. His senses returned upon that day a week earlier; but after some hours’ calm sleep, he woke in so enfeebled a state that it required all the efforts of nurse and doctor to keep him from sinking calmly away into the great sleep of all.

Now he was undoubtedly amending, and getting better hour after hour, though still so weak that he was unconscious of who it was who tended him night and day. Nothing seemed to trouble him. Nature had prescribed utter rest so that she might have time to rebuild the waste, and the Doctor’s chief efforts were directed towards keeping him free from the slightest trouble which might ripple the placid lake of his existence.

“There now,” he said, “let him sleep all he can. That is the best.”

He walked over to the mine, arriving there soon after the engineer had gone, and avoiding Jessop, went straight into the room occupied by Sturgess, who lay waiting for him eagerly.

“Better, arn’t I, Doctor?”

“Yes; getting stronger fast. The festering wound looks healthy now.”

“What festering wound?” said the man, with a stare.

“The one in your shoulder, which you said was caused by a fall.”

Sturgess scowled.

“Lucky for you I was fetched to you in time, and then dressed the wound in your leg. Your flesh was in a bad way, my man. You should never neglect the bite of a dog.”

“Fear he should go mad?” said Sturgess grimly. “No fear o’ that one going mad now.”

“Shot him, I suppose.”

“Yes,” said Sturgess, smiling. “I shot him, Doctor. When may I get about again?”

“Oh, not for a week or two yet – perhaps three. You mustn’t hurry.”

“Can’t you get me up in a week, sir?” said the man anxiously. “I have got a good deal to do.”

“Not in the mine. That’s at an end.”

“Yes, I heard that. But no, it arn’t that. It’s business I want to settle about some one I know.”

“Ah, well, we shall see,” said the Doctor. “Be patient.”

He walked back to the cottage, and not seeing either the Major or his child, hung up his hat, and went to Clive’s chamber, where he stopped short at the door, startled by the scene within. For Dinah was in the act of advancing to the bed just as Clive lay half dozing.

The sharp crack of a floor board roused him into wakefulness, and he opened his eyes wonderingly, so that they fell upon Dinah’s sweet, sad face.

The result was startling to the Doctor, and filled Dinah with agonising despair. For as the light of recognition came into the suffering man’s countenance, his features contracted, his brow wrinkled and twitched, and he turned his eyes away with a look of disgust and horror, while Dinah uttered a low moan, covered her face with her hands, and fled from the room, her whole attitude and every movement suggesting utter despair.