“Well, then, dearest,” said he sweetly, “we have nothing to reproach ourselves with.” Then he knit his brow gloomily. “It is worse than I thought. It seems even one's country patients go to another doctor when they visit London. It is hard. It is hard.”
Rosa leaned her head on his shoulder, and curled round him, as one she would shield against the world's injustice; but she said nothing; she was a little frightened at his eye that lowered, and his noble frame that trembled a little, with ire suppressed.
Two days after this, a brougham drove up to the door, and a tallish, fattish, pasty-faced man got out, and inquired for Dr. Staines.
He was shown into the dining-room, and told Jane he had come to consult the doctor.
Rosa had peeped over the stairs, all curiosity; she glided noiselessly down, and with love's swift foot got into the yard before Jane. “He is come! he is come! Kiss me.”
Dr. Staines kissed her first, and then asked who was come.
“Oh, nobody of any consequence. ONLY the first patient. Kiss me again.”
Dr. Staines kissed her again, and then was for going to the first patient.
“No,” said she; “not yet. I met a doctor's wife at Dr. Mayne's, and she told me things. You must always keep them waiting; or else they think nothing of you. Such a funny woman! 'Treat 'em like dogs, my dear,' she said. But I told her they wouldn't come to be treated like dogs or any other animal.”
“You had better have kept that to yourself, I think.”