"Nay," said Stirling, "it's yer own obstinacy that's had ye down, man. If ye'd listened to yer London doctor at first, mayhap ye wouldn't have had to travel from Euston in an invalid's carriage. If ye hadn't had the misfortune to be born an obstinate simpleton ye'd ha' been up and about six weeks back. But there's no doing anything with you geniuses. It's all nerves with you and your like."
"Nerves!" exclaimed Edward Henry, pretending to scorn. But he was delighted at the diagnosis.
"Nerves," repeated the doctor, firmly. "Ye go gadding off to America. Ye get yeself mixed up in theatres.... How's the theatre? I see yer famous play's coming to an end next week."
"And what if it is?" said Edward Henry, jealous for reputations, including his own. "It will have run for a hundred and one nights. And right through August too! No modern poetry play ever did run as long in London, and no other ever will. I've given the intellectual theatre the biggest ad. it ever had. And I've made money on it. I should have made more if I'd ended the run a fortnight ago, but I was determined to pass the hundredth night. And I shall do!"
"And what are ye for giving next?"
"I'm not for giving anything next, doc. I've let the Regent for five years at seven thousand five hundred pounds a year to a musical comedy [313] syndicate, since you're so curious. And when I've paid the ground rent and taxes and repairs, and something towards a sinking-fund, and six per cent on my capital, I shall have not far off two thousand pounds a year clear annual profit. You may say what you like, but that's what I call business!"
It was a remarkable fact that, while giving undemanded information to Dr. Stirling, Edward Henry was in reality defending himself against the accusations of his wife—accusations which, by the way, she had never uttered, but which he thought he read sometimes in her face. He might of course have told his wife these agreeable details directly, and in private. But he was a husband, and, like many husbands, apt to be indirect.
Nellie said not a word.
"Then you're giving up London?" The doctor rose to depart.
"I am," said Edward Henry, almost blushing.