CHAPTER XIII.
DOCTOR MAY’S PATIENT.
Colonel Dacre would never forget that night of torture. The fever seemed to increase every hour, until the very pillows felt as if they were burning hot, and he stepped out of his tumbled bed, at last, and threw himself on the floor. The only comfort he had was in repeating to himself again and again: “She will come to-day—she will come to-day!” But the day passed, somehow, and there was no sign of Lady Gwendolyn.
When the evening came round again he felt badly enough to alarm him a little, and he made the waiter fetch him a doctor. The pompous medico looked very grave when he had felt Colonel Dacre’s pulse.
“Why, really, my dear sir, you must have been excessively imprudent!” he said. “Where did you get your cold?”
Lawrence answered him by another question.
“Have I a cold, then?”
“Aye, and with a vengeance. I doubt if you will be able to leave your bed for another fortnight.”
Colonel Dacre uttered a cry of dismay.
“Nonsense, doctor, it can’t be as bad as that. Do oblige me by sitting down, and in ten minutes I shall be able to prove to you that I am already on the high way to recovery.”
The doctor smiled. If his patient did talk a little nonsense, it was natural enough. With such a pulse nothing better could be expected of him.
“Or rather say you will be shortly, if you keep quiet,” he said, with the diplomatic air of a man who is accustomed to humor sick people’s fancies.
“Well, but what is the matter with me? I would rather know the truth, if you please.”
“You have inflammation of the lungs, and as you have evidently no constitutional weakness of the chest, you must have been terribly reckless to get yourself in such a state as this.”
“I am not conscious of having misconducted myself as you suggest,” he answered dryly. “People are unaccountably ill sometimes, surely.”
“There must be a cause.”
“That’s begging the question,” said Colonel Dacre, ashamed to find himself so irritable. “You must really excuse me, doctor, but my nerves feel so jarred, it would be quite a pleasure to me to make myself disagreeable.”
“Do, by all means, if it would be any relief to you,” returned the other cheerfully. “But I ought to tell you that I fear you are on the brink of a very serious illness, and that it would be better for you to get into a quieter place while you can be moved.”
“But I am very comfortable here, doctor.”
“For the moment; but you will need more quiet than you can get at an hotel, however well-conducted it may be. You will be obliged to have a nurse——”
“Never!” he cried emphatically. “Sairey Gamp has always been my bugbear!”
“So she has mine,” was the reply. “And, therefore, all the nurses I recommend are comparatively young, and are always bright and pleasant-looking.”
“And do they have a bottle of gin on the mantelpiece to put their lips to when so disposed?”
“My nurses are teetotalers; all they expect in the way of stimulant is plenty of strong tea, and I don’t imagine you would grudge them that.”
“Not if they drink it elsewhere; but I don’t want coddling, doctor. I shall be all right again in a day or two, no doubt.”
The other shook his head.
“I don’t want to be a Job’s comforter, but I can’t say I see much chance of that. Anyhow, if you will stay at this hotel you had better move into quieter rooms on an upper landing. You cannot surely object to that?”
Colonel Dacre made this concession readily enough, and as Doctor May found he was likely to be rather an intractable patient, he gave the necessary orders at once.
In another hour Colonel Dacre found himself in new quarters high up at the back of the house, where it was cooler and quieter both.
He was given over to a chambermaid now, and welcomed the amendment, for her step was lighter, her service more gentle. She even showed a certain interest in his state, and wanted to know if he hadn’t a mother, or a wife, or any one to take care of him, sighing sympathetically when he declared himself to be alone in the world.
Colonel Dacre thought the matter over very exhaustively that evening. Doctor May, who paid him a visit at about nine, had given him an opiate which soothed his nerves, and kept him quiet, although it did not make him sleep, and therefore he had plenty of time for reflection.
Strange to say, his head was singularly clear all that night, but toward morning he found his mind wandering off, and was very angry with himself, persisting in thinking it must be his own fault.
When Doctor May called in the morning, Colonel Dacre evidently looked upon his visit as an intrusion, but was careful to be distantly polite.
“I have a vague recollection of having seen you before,” he said; “but my memory is so bad I cannot recall your name.”
“I am Doctor May; you sent for me yesterday, you know,” answered the other quietly. “I am afraid you are not feeling so well.”
“Nothing much the matter—all right to-morrow,” he muttered hoarsely. And then he added, in a confidential tone: “Will you do something for me?”
“Willingly, if I can.”
“Let them show her up directly she comes. She is peculiarly sensitive, I must tell you, and the least delay—you understand?”
“I understand,” repeated Doctor May, smiling reassuringly into his haggard eyes. “You wish her to be brought up-stairs directly she arrives?”
Colonel Dacre, usually one of the most reserved men in England, seized his hand, and pressed it warmly. Then, straightening himself as he lay, he said with the graceful courtesy of a man of the world:
“I shall hope to see you at my wedding, doctor——”
“May,” put in the other.
“Doctor May. It will take place by special license to-morrow at twelve. I can’t remember where at this moment, but that is immaterial. However, I have a word for your private ear.” Doctor May bent his head close to the other’s lips. “She is the sweetest woman in England; but she has one little defect—come closer if you please—she—she——”
Doctor May looked at him compassionately as he sank back on his pillow, muttering incoherently, for he greatly feared that in spite of his iron frame, he would not be able to pull his patient through, and it seemed hard he should die in his prime, and die solitary and alone.