Doctor Luttrell's First Patient. Rosa Nouchette Carey
to play. I think I have found a nice little place for Susan. She is to sleep at home, but will have all her meals and half-a-crown a week, and the lady will teach her everything; that is pretty fair for a beginning, and as father says, the money will just find her in shoe-leather and aprons. Father's looking out for a place for Joe now."
"I wish Susan could have a place like mine, mother," returned Martha, proudly. "They are real gentlefolks, that is what they are. 'Will you be so good as to clean my boots, Martha?' or 'Thank you, Martha,' when I dry the paper of a morning. Oh, it is like play living at the corner house, and as for that darling Miss Baby——" but here words failed Martha.
It could not be denied that Olivia was unusually depressed that afternoon, fog and damp always had this effect on her. Her nature needed sunshine and crisp, bracing air.
There was no buoyancy and elasticity in her tread. When people looked at her, as they often did, for her pliant, slim figure rather attracted notice, she thought they were only commenting on her old black hat and jacket. Only one article of her dress satisfied her; her boots were neat and strong. Marcus had found her one wet day warming her feet at the fire and had gone off to examine her boots without a word. Olivia had flushed up and looked uncomfortable when he came back with the boots in his hand.
"Do you want to be laid up with bronchitis or congestion of the lungs?" he asked, rather sadly, as he showed her the thin, worn soles; "do you think that will make things easier for me, Livy?" The next day he had taken her himself to the bootmaker's and had had her fitted with a serviceable stout pair.
Somehow in spite of her pleasure in the boots and Marcus's thoughtfulness she had felt rather like a scolded child.
Her unusual pessimism had a moment's distraction, for as she passed the print-shop, at the corner of Harbut Street, she saw her mysterious old gentleman standing still on the pavement fixedly regarding a small oil-painting.
Olivia had a good view of the lean, cadaverous face and peaked white beard; the heavy grey eyebrows seemed to beetle over the dark sunken eyes.
"After all he looks more like a Spaniard than a Russian," she thought, and again her theory of the Roman Catholic priest came into her mind. "If I could only see him without his hat, I should know if he had a tonsure," and then with youthful curiosity she looked to see what picture had interested him.
It was a small painting of the Prodigal Son, but was evidently by no amateur, the face of both father and son were admirably portrayed. The strong Syrian faces were mellowed by the ruddy gleams of sunset. A tame kid was gambolling behind them, and two women were grinding corn, with the millstone between them. On the flat white roof of the house, another woman had just laid aside her distaff in a hurry. The father's arms with their gold bracelets were clasping the gaunt, sharp shoulders of the starving youth.
Olivia knew the picture well. Marcus had been very much struck with it, it was good work, he said; the Syrian faces were perfect types, and he had made Olivia notice the strong resemblance between father and son.
"That is the mother, I suppose?" had been her comment; "she has just caught sight of them, there is a puzzled look in her eyes as she lays aside her distaff, as though she is not quite sure that that wild-looking figure in sheep-skin is her own long-lost son."
"It must be a grand thing to be an artist," was Marcus's reply to this. "Goddard, I do not know the name; the picture is cheap, too, only 25 pounds, but I would wager any money that it was painted in Syria."
Olivia stole a second glance at the old man, but he never moved; then she shivered, and walked faster. It was bitterly cold, a miserable afternoon for Marcus, who was visiting his poor patients in the squalid back streets and slums that fringed Brompton.
Mayfield Villas were about ten minutes' walk from Galvaston Terrace; the villas had verandahs and long, narrow gardens, but most of them had lodgings to let.
Mrs. Broderick and her maid occupied the first floor at number six, the drawing-room and back bedroom belonged to the invalid, and Deborah had a tiny room close by her mistress, the other room had been converted into a kitchen; none of the rooms were large, but they were well-furnished, and thoroughly comfortable. During her husband's lifetime Mrs. Broderick had been comfortably off, and had had a good house—the carved book-cases, Turkey-carpet, and deep easy-chairs, and a few proof-engravings handsomely framed, all spoke of better days.
When Olivia's foot sounded on the stairs, a tall, hard-featured woman came out of the kitchen.
"I knew it was you," she said. "Come in. My mistress is just wearying for you. She never sleeps in daylight, and it is ill-reading and working in the fading light. I will soon have the tea ready. I have been baking some scones."
Olivia sniffed the warm perfume delightedly. She was hungry, oh, so hungry! although two hours had not elapsed since dinner-time, and Deb's scones, with sweet, fresh country butter, was ambrosial food.
"Don't let Deb keep you with her chatter, come ben, my woman, as my poor Fergus would have said."
The voice was peculiarly youthful and melodious, the timbre exquisite in modulation and volume, but the face belonged to a woman aged more by pain and trouble than years.
Madge Broderick had never been a handsome woman, her nose was too long, and her skin too sallow for beauty, but her bright eyes and a certain gracefulness of figure, and her beautiful voice had been her charms. Fergus Broderick, a rough Scotchman, with a tongue as uncouth as his native dales, had fallen in love with her at their first meeting; he had been invited to dine at the house of the senior partner, in whose employ he was, and as the awkward, bashful young Scotchman entered the firelit room, a clear laugh from amongst a group of girls gathered round the hearth penetrated like music to his ear.
"Parting is such sweet sorrow," said the voice, with much pathos, "that I could say good-bye until the morrow; those are your sentiments, Katie, are they not?"
"Hush, Madge! here is Mr. Broderick waiting for us to speak to him," and the daughter of the house rose with a laugh to greet him.
When the lamps were lighted Fergus Broderick had scanned all the girlish faces with furtive eagerness. He had felt a shock of disappointment when the owner of the exquisite voice had revealed her identity. Madge's long nose and sallow skin were no beauties certainly; nevertheless, before the evening was over, Fergus Broderick knew he had found his mate; and for eight blissful years Madge dwelt in her woman's kingdom, and gathered more roses than thorns.
Her first trouble had been the loss of her boy; he had succumbed to some childish ailment; her husband's death—the result of an accident—had followed a few months later.
The strain of the long nursing and excessive grief had broken down Madge Broderick's strength. The seeds of an unsuspected disease latent in her system now showed itself, and for some two or three years her sufferings, both mental and physical, would have killed most women.
Then came alleviation and the lull that resembles peace; the pain was no longer so acute; the disease had reached a stage when there would be days and even weeks of tolerable comfort; then Madge courageously set herself to make the most of her life.
With a courage that was almost heroic, she divided and subdivided the hours of each day—so many duties, so many hours of recreation. She had her charity work, her fancy work, her heavy and light reading; books and flowers were her luxuries; the newest books, the sweetest flowers, were always to be found on the table beside her couch.
Madge often said laughingly that she lived in a world of her own. "But I have very good society," she would add; "the best and wisest of all ages give me their company. This morning I was listening to Plato's Dialogues, and this afternoon Sir Edwin Arnold was entertaining me at the Maple Club in Tokio. This evening—well, please do not think me frivolous, but affairs at Rome and a certain Prince Saracinesca claim my attention.
"A good novel puts me in a better humour and disposes me to sleep, you know," she would finish, brightly, "that I always read aloud to Fergus in the evening; we were going through a course of Thackeray—we were in the middle of 'Philip on his way through the world' when