The Doctor's Dilemma. Stretton Hesba
delightful than the care with which a man prepares a home for his future wife. The very tint of the walls, and the way the light falls in through the windows, would become matters of grave importance. In what pleasant spot shall her favorite chair be placed? And what picture shall hang opposite it to catch her eye the oftenest? Where is her piano to stand? What china, and glass, and silver, is she to use? Where are the softest carpets to be found for her feet to tread? In short, where is the very best and daintiest of every thing to be had, for the best and daintiest little bride the sun ever shone on?
There was not the slightest flavor of this sentiment in our furnishing of our new house. It was really more Julia's business than mine. We had had dozens of furnishing lists to peruse from the principal houses in London and Paris, as if even there it was a well-understood thing that Julia and I were going to be married. We had toiled through these catalogues, making pencil-marks in them, as though they were catalogues of an art exhibition. We had prudently settled the precise sum (of Julia's money) which we were to lay out. Julia's taste did not often agree with mine, as she had no eye for the harmonies of color—a singular deficiency among us, as most of the Guernsey women are born artists. We were constantly compelled to come to a compromise, each yielding some point; not without a secret misgiving on my part that the new house would have many an eyesore about it for me. But then it was Julia's money that was doing it, and after all she was more anxious to please me than I deserved.
That afternoon Pellet and I, like two assistants in a furnishing-house, unrolled carpets and stretched them along the floors before the critical gaze of my mother and Julia. We unpacked chairs and tables, scanning anxiously for damages on the polished wood, and setting them one after another in a row against the walls. I went about as in some dream. The house commanded a splendid view of the whole group of the Channel Islands, and the rocky islets innumerable strewed about the sea. The afternoon sun was shining full upon Sark, and whenever I looked through the window I could see the cliffs of the Havre Gosselin, purple in the distance, with a silver thread of foam at their foot. No wonder that my thoughts wandered, and the words my mother and Julia were speaking went in at one ear and out at the other. Certainly I was dreaming; but which part was the dream?
"I don't believe he cares a straw about the carpets!" exclaimed Julia, in a disappointed tone.
"I do indeed, dear Julia," I said, bringing myself back to the carpets. Here I had been obliged to give in to Julia's taste. She had set her mind upon having flowers in her drawing-room carpet, and there they were, large garlands of bright-colored blossoms, very gay, and, as I ventured to remark to myself, very gaudy.
"You like it better than you did in the pattern?" she asked, anxiously.
I did not like it one whit better, but I should have been a brute if I had said so. She was gazing at it and me with so troubled an expression, that I felt it necessary to set her mind at ease.
"It is certainly handsomer than the pattern?" I said, regarding it attentively; "very much handsomer."
"You like it better than the plain thing you chose at first?" pursued Julia.
I was about to be hunted into a corner, and forced into denying my own taste—a process almost more painful than denying one's faith—when my mother came to my rescue. She could read us both as an open book, and knew the precise moment to come between us.
"Julia, my love," she said, "remember that we wish to show Martin those patterns while it is daylight. To-morrow is Sunday, you know."
A little tinge of color crept over Julia's tintless face as she told Pellet he might go. I almost wished that I might be dismissed too; but it was only a vague, wordless wish. We then drew near to the window, from which we could see Sark so clearly, and Julia drew out of her pocket a very large envelope, which was bursting with its contents.
They were small scraps of white silk and white satin. I took them mechanically into my hand, and could not help admiring the pure, lustrous, glossy beauty of them. I passed my fingers over them softly. There was something in the sight of them that moved me, as if they were fragments of the shining garments of some vision, which in times gone by, when I was much younger, had now and then floated before my fancy. I did not know any one lovely enough to wear raiment of glistening white like these, unless—unless—. A passing glimpse of the pure white face, and glossy hair, and deep gray eyes of my Sark patient flashed across me.
"They are patterns for Julia's wedding-dress," said my mother, in a low, tender voice.
CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH.
TRUE TO BOTH.
"For Julia!" I repeated, the treacherous vision fading away instantaneously. "Oh, yes! I understand. They are very beautiful—very beautiful indeed."
"Which do you like most?" asked Julia, in a whisper, as she leaned against my shoulder.
"I like them all," I said. "There is scarcely any difference among them that I can see."
"No difference!" she exclaimed. "That is so like a man! Why, they are as different as can be. Look here, this one is only five shillings a yard, and that is twelve. Isn't that a difference?"
"A very great one," I replied. "But do you think you will look well in white, my dear Julia? You never do wear white."
"A bride cannot wear any thing but white," she said, angrily. "I declare, Martin, you would not mind if I looked a perfect fright."
"But I should mind very much," I urged, putting my arm around her; "for you will be my wife then, Julia."
She smiled almost for the first time that afternoon, for her mind had been full of the furniture, and too burdened for happiness. But now she looked happy.
"You can be as nice and good as any one, when you like," she said, gently.
"I shall always be nice and good when we are married," I answered, with a laugh. "You are not afraid of venturing, are you, Julia?"
"Not the least in the world," she said. "I know you, Martin, and I can trust you implicitly."
My heart ached at the words, so softly and warmly spoken. But I laughed again—at myself this time, not at her. Why should she not trust me? I would be as true as steel to her. I loved no one better, and I would take care not to love any one. My word, my honor, my troth, were all plighted to her. Only a scoundrel and a fool would be unfaithful to an engagement like ours.
We walked home together, we three, all contented and all happy. We had a good deal to talk of during the evening, and sat up late. Sundry small events had happened in Guernsey during my six-days' absence, and these were discussed with that charming minuteness with which women canvass family matters. It was midnight before I found myself alone in my own room.
I had half forgotten the crumpled paper in my waistcoat-pocket, but now I smoothed it out before me and pondered over every word. No, there could not be a doubt that it referred to Miss Ollivier. "Bright-brown hair, gray eyes, and delicate features." That exactly corresponded with her appearance. "Blue-silk dress, and seal-skin jacket and hat." It was precisely the dress which Tardif had described. "Fifty pounds reward." That was a large sum to offer, and the inference was that her friends were persons of good means, and anxious for her recovery.
Why should she have strayed from home? That was the question. What possible reason could there have been, strong enough to impel a young and delicately-nurtured girl to run all the risks and dangers of a flight alone and unprotected? Her friends evidently believed that she had not been run away with; there was not the ordinary element of an elopement in this case.
But Miss Ollivier had assured me she had no friends. What did she mean by the word? Here were persons evidently anxious to discover her place of concealment. Were they friends? or could they by any chance be enemies? This is not an age when enmity is very rampant. For my own part, I had not an enemy in the world. Why should this pretty, habitually-obedient, self-controlled girl have