The door closed on her, the smile fled, and a somber look of care and suffering took its place.
Sir Charles entered at once on what was next his heart, told Dr. Suaby he was in some anxiety, and asked him if he had observed anything in Lady Bassett.
“Nothing new,” said Dr. Suaby; “charming as ever.”
Then Sir Charles confided to Dr. Suaby, in terms of deep feeling and anxiety, what I have coldly told the reader.
Dr. Suaby looked a little grave, and took time to think before he spoke.
At last he delivered an opinion, of which this is the substance, though not the exact words.
“It is sudden and unnatural, and I cannot say it does not partake of mental aberration. If the patient was a man I should fear the most serious results; but here we have to take into account the patient's sex, her nature, and her present condition. Lady Bassett has always appeared to me a very remarkable woman. She has no mediocrity in anything; understanding keen, perception wonderfully swift, heart large and sensitive, nerves high strung, sensibilities acute. A person of her sex, tuned so high as this, is always subject, more or less, to hysteria. It is controlled by her intelligence and spirit; but she is now, for the time being, in a physical condition that has often deranged less sensitive women than she is. I believe this about the boy to be a hysterical delusion, which will pass away when her next child is born. That is to say, she will probably ignore her first-born, and everything else, for a time; but these caprices, springing in reality from the body rather than the mind, cannot endure forever. When she has several grown-up children the first-born will be the favorite. It comes to that at last, my good friend.”
“These are the words of wisdom,” said Sir Charles; “God bless you for them!”
After a while he said, “Then what you advise is simply—patience?”
“No, I don't say that. With such a large house as this, and your resources, you might easily separate them before the delusion grows any farther. Why risk a calamity?”