“Ah-h! Well, as you are here, Sir Reginald, I want to speak to you. The child is all right, there is not the slightest fear of him—a bad attack of croup; but I’ve pulled children through worse often. That idiot of a nurse, to swell her own importance, seems to have frightened Lady Fairfax nearly into fits. I never thought much of that nurse—never; I often told you so,” nodding solemnly at Alice. “Well, we may as well go downstairs, Sir Reginald. Good-night, Lady Fairfax; good-night, and go to bed.”
Together they descended to the library. The doctor, having usurped the rug and refreshed himself with some spirits and water, said abruptly:
“I want particularly to speak to you, Sir Reginald, now you are here, about your wife. The boy is all right, he will live to plague you for many a year; he is as strong as a pony; there’s no fear of him.”
“Do you mean,” said Sir Reginald, fixing on him an eye piercing as an eagle’s, “that there is fear of my wife?”
“I do,” he replied emphatically, “and I think it my duty to tell you so, now you are here. That you set off to India and left a delicate girl of seventeen moping here alone is your concern, of course!”
“Of course,” repeated his host, reddening with anger.
Dr. Barton eyed the young man standing before him with a resentful glance from under his bushy, luxuriant, gray eyebrows.
“He looks overbearing, harsh, and cold. I’ve no doubt he treats her as he treats his troopers; I’ll not spare him then. Your wife,” clearing his throat and speaking slowly, “will probably leave you a widower ere long. She comes of a delicate stock, and, as far as I can observe, is rapidly following in her mother’s footsteps.”
Seeing that this thrust told, he continued:
“She is subject to deadly fainting fits, and might go off in one of them any day.”