The Challenge of Love. Victorian Romance Novel
had lifted the flags. There were flower borders under the house, full of old-fashioned black velvet and old gold polyanthuses, Lent lilies, and London pride. The date 1678 was carved on a stone let into the brick face of the porch.
Wolfe had his hand on the iron bell-pull when the oak door swung open, and he found himself looking into the eyes of a tall girl whose black hair fell over her shoulders. Lithe, dark, and alert, she had come sailing down the broad oak stairs, hair flying, brown eyes full of a glitter of haste.
The door was hardly open when Wolfe saw the girl’s face change its expression. There was a mobility about her that was quick and free as the sunlight over the moor.
“I thought Dr. Threadgold——Are you a doctor?”
“I am Dr. Threadgold’s assistant.”
The girl had no self-consciousness. She was an intense and rather passionate young person, whose pale face radiated an impetuous sincerity. She looked at Wolfe with unsophisticated displeasure, and kept one hand on the edge of the door.
“We sent for Dr. Threadgold——”
“Dr. Threadgold was out. I came to see if I could be of any use.”
The girl’s eyes looked into Wolfe’s eyes. For the moment she appeared to challenge him, and to stand waiting at the doorway of her intuition. Wolfe looked back at her with a frankness that did not intend to suffer a repulse.
“It is Mrs. Mascall who is ill, is it not?”
The girl still seemed to be waiting for some decisive impression.
“Yes.”
“I have left my horse at the gate. If you prefer to wait three or four hours I can ride back to Navestock and send Dr. Threadgold over.”
She looked at him fixedly. There was the faintest glimmer of amusement in the man’s eyes.
“That sounds silly.”
“It does, doesn’t it?”
She began to smile.
“You know—I felt——”
“Of course you did.”
“Dr. Threadgold’s young—his assistants——”
“Young fools—shall we say!”
“I never meant that——”
“Say fools and we will shake hands on it.”
She stepped back with a frank, girlish laugh and let him in. Impetuosity was part of her nature. She was a moor child, bred to galloping ponies and the rush of the wind.
“I’ll run up and tell mother. Oh, I say, what’s your name?”
“Wolfe.”
The quip took them at the same moment.
“Wolf! Well, I did my best!”
“I’m a tame one. People don’t trouble to slam the door.”
She looked him in the eyes, and her frank glance said: “I like you.” Wolfe watched her go running up the oak stairs, her short green skirt dancing about her slim black ankles.
She had left him in a great stone-paved hall, a dim place, full of queer perfumes, old furniture, and old prints. A blunderbuss hung by a strap from a nail. In one corner stood a huge oak cupboard, its scutcheon plates and hinges bright as silver. A stone-paved passage disappeared under a heavy green curtain. Oak doors opened here and there. A red cloak and a whip lay tossed upon a round, pedestal table with claw feet.
The girl came back for Wolfe, and her face looked a little anxious.
“Please come up. Mother seems very ill. She can hardly get her breath—though she never will make a fuss.”
Wolfe climbed the stairs, looking up into the girl’s face. It was a face that had none of the beauty of regularity. The chin was a trifle too strong, the mouth too large, the cheeks not sufficiently rounded. But like many irregular faces it had the fascination of its irregularities, its characteristic and provoking flashes of expression that leaped out with the swiftness of sunlight from behind a cloud.
Wolfe felt the lure of the child’s free, flashing spirit. Her perfect health seemed to live in the black masses of her hair.
“I hope I shall soon put things right. Are you Miss Mascall?”
“Yes, I’m Jess.”
“Jess?”
“Just Jess—as father used to say.”
“Was that because you were—naughty?”
“I won’t say that it wasn’t!”
In one of the big south bedrooms Wolfe found a rosy, middle-aged woman in the thick of a bad attack of asthma. She was propped up in a four-post bedstead, her handsome and good-tempered face suffused and anxious, her black hair braided under a neat muslin cap. She smiled at Wolfe through the labour of her breathing, and nodded Jess out of the room.
“It’s good of you to come so soon, doctor. I do hate making a bother——”
“We live—by being bothered.”
“Well, that’s honest, isn’t it! Sit down, doctor. I haven’t had an attack like this for years. I used to hang on to the mantelpiece, or anything I could get hold of. The fact is——”
“Don’t talk if it bothers you.”
“I’m a terrible talker, you know, doctor.”
She looked it, with her round, handsome, lovable face, her generous, voluble mouth, and her motherly hands. Mary was her name, and a Mary she was.
“You know, doctor, my kitchen girl and I cleaned out the old lumber-room. It must have been the dust that did it.”
“No doubt. Now, don’t worry yourself for a moment.”
Wolfe made his examination, and then sat down on a chair beside the bed.
“I think we can soon make you easy. Has Dr. Threadgold ever given you medicine for this?”
“Not for years, sir.”
“You are careful about your food?”
Mrs. Mascall looked guiltily cheerful.
“I’m afraid I’m a regular girl, doctor. When something good comes——”
“I know. You are too—happy.”
“Now, that’s just the word. I never worry about anything. And I never feel like being ill. But I do hate giving trouble.”
“Nonsense. It’s a pleasure to take care of happy people. Now, I’ll ride back at once and make you up some physic. Can you send anyone over?”
“Bob can go on the pony.”
“Good. Keep to light food, and have the windows open. I’ll ride off at once.”
Mrs. Mascall gave him a grateful hand.
“You’ve made me feel better. I do dislike your undertaker sort of man.”
“So do I. Shall I send your daughter up?”
“Yes, please do.”
Jess Mascall was waiting in the hall. Her brown eyes were anxious, but very friendly. Wolfe reassured her.
“We will soon put your mother at ease.”
“Then it’s not dangerous?”
“No. Bob, the boy, is to ride over at once for medicine. I am going straight back to Navestock. Your mother would like you in her room.”
Jess followed him to the porch.
“I was a silly,” she said, as he turned to give