King of the Castle

“Terribly crushed, my dear; better leave them together alone.”

“But – you do not think – oh, Doctor Asher, you can save him?”

“Is it so bad as that, sir?” whispered Glyddyr, as he saw the peculiar look in the doctor’s face. “Couldn’t you – with more help – shall I send?”

“My dear sir,” said the doctor in a low voice, “half a dozen of the crack London surgeons couldn’t save him.”

“Oh!” sighed Claude again. “But a clergyman. Mr Glyddyr, would you go into Danmouth?”

“Better not, my dear child,” said the doctor quietly. “You know their peculiar tenets. His wife was praying with him when I came out.”

As if to endorse the doctor’s words, the low, constant murmur of a voice was heard from within, and from time to time a gasping utterance was heard, and then twice over the word “Amen.”

Just then Claude stepped softly toward the open doorway, and sank upon her knees with her hands clasped, and her face turned up appealingly toward the sunny sky, while all around seemed full of life, and hope, though the black shadow of death was closing in upon the humble roof. And as Glyddyr saw the sweet, pure, upturned face, with its closed eyes, he involuntarily took off his hat, and gazed wistfully, with something very near akin to love seeming to swell within his breast.

The silence was very deep, though the murmur from the cottage continued, till, in the midst of what seemed to be a painful pause, a loud and bitter wail came upon the stillness, and the doctor hurriedly stepped within.

“Poor Ike’s cottage is to let, mates,” said a rough, low voice; “who wants to make a change?”

“Dead?” asked Claude, with a motion of her lips, as after a short space the doctor returned.

“No; the draught I have given him to dull the pain has had effect: he is asleep.”

“And when he awakes, Doctor Asher?” whispered Claude, as she clung to his arm.

The doctor shook his head.

“Can you do nothing?”

“Only try to lull the pain,” was the reply. And then quickly, “Wanted somewhere else?”

This last was to himself as a man was seen running toward them, and Claude turned if possible paler as she recognised one of the servants from the Fort.

He ran up breathlessly.

“Miss Claude – Doctor Asher,” he panted. “Come at once. Master’s got another of his fits.”

Volume One – Chapter Five.

The Doctor is King

“Don’t be flurried, my dear,” said Doctor Asher, as, in a calm, business-like way, he saw to Gartram being laid easily on the floor, where he had fallen in the study.

“But he looks so ghastly. You do not think – ”

“Yes, I do, my child,” said the doctor cheerfully. “Not what you think, because I know. He has another fit precisely the same as the last, and it was evidently a sudden seizure, just as he had risen from his chair, after writing that letter.”

“Then there is no danger?”

“Oh, dear, no. That’s right, you see. We’ll have this mattress on the floor; and he can lie here. Don’t be alarmed.”

“But I am horribly alarmed.”

“Then you must not be, my child. I will not conceal the fact from you that he will probably be subject to more fits, and may have one at any time.”

“But I feel so helpless.”

“So does a doctor, my dear. We try all we can, but time has to perform the greater part of the cure, after we have done all we can to avoid suffocation, and the patient injuring himself in his struggles. There, there; he’s going on all right, and you’ve been a very good, brave girl. I quite admire your behaviour all through; and another time, if I am not here, you will know exactly how to act.”

“Oh, don’t talk of another time, Doctor Asher.”

“Well, I will not,” he said, smiling. “Now, don’t be alarmed, but keep perfectly cool, for I must go back and see to that poor fellow at the quarry.”

“Yes, of course. But, doctor, if my poor father should be taken worse?”

“He will not be taken worse, but gradually mend. I shall not be very long away.”

“No, no; pray don’t be long.”

“No; and mind you are my assistant. So you must be cool and self-possessed. Shall I send Miss Dillon to sit with you?”

“Yes, please, do,” said the agitated girl, as she gazed wildly at her father’s altered face.

Doctor Asher seemed rather to resemble a very smooth, black tom cat, and, as he drew down his cuffs, and passed his white hands over his glossy coat, an imaginative person would not have been much surprised to see him begin to lick himself, to remove a few specks caused by the business in which he had been engaged.

As he left the study and crossed the hall, with its polished granite flooring, his delicate manner of proceeding toward the drawing-room, and stepping from one to another of the oases of Eastern rugs, was still like the progress of the cat who believed the polished granite to be water, and tried to avoid wetting his paws.

When he laid his hand upon the drawing-room door, a murmur of voices came from within, and, as he entered, Mary Dillon jumped up from the low ottoman upon which she had been seated, talking to Glyddyr, and ran quickly to the doctor’s side.

“How is he?” she said excitedly.

“Better, certainly. Miss Gartram wants you to go and stay with her.”

“Yes, of course. Good-bye, Mr Glyddyr, and thank you for being so kind.”

She spoke as she ran to the door, jerked the last words back over her shoulder, and was gone, leaving the doctor face to face with the visitor.

“How is he?” said the latter. “You can speak plainly to me.”

“To be sure I can, my dear sir. Ah, what a world this is. Yesterday we were taking our champagne in the saloon of your charming yacht, to-day – ”

“You are keeping me waiting for an answer,” said Glyddyr, rather stiffly.

“So I am,” said the doctor, smiling. “Well, how is he? Rather bad. Nasty fit of his usual sort.”

“Then he is subject to these fits?”

“Most decidedly.”