"Most assuredly!" was the answer. "So will you, and so shall I. But not of such a scratch as this, while under my care! No! No! We will set him on his legs, Waif, in less than a fortnight. Then he will pay his doctor's bill, walk off with a huge appetite, and we shall see him no more."
Her face, over which every shade of hope and fear had passed while she listened, looked very grave and earnest now.
"Am I to nurse him, Patron?" said she; "we can keep him safe and quiet in here, and I can see after his wants while you attend to the people that come to consult you, patients and——"
"Fools—" added the old man. "Fools, who are yet so wise in their folly as to purchase ease of mind at a price they would grudge for health of body. It's a worse trade, Waif, to set a broken leg than to heal a broken heart. We want skill, learning, splints, bandages, and anatomy for the one, but a little cunning and a bold guess will answer all purposes for the other. There are many men and more women who would laugh in my face if I told them their head was a workshop and their heart a pump; yet they can believe the whole of their future life is contained in a pack of cards. You and I, Waif, have thriven well in a world of fools—and the fools thrive too—why, I know not. The wisest people on earth are your people, but they have never prospered. Is it best to be true, simple, honest? I cannot answer—I have never tried."
"I will do everything you tell me," persisted Waif, taking for granted the permission she was so eager to obtain. "I can creep about the chamber like a mouse; I never want to sleep, nor eat, nor drink, nor go out into the filthy muddy streets. I know every phial in the surgery as well as yourself. Hand him over to me, Patron, and I will promise to bring him through."
He eyed her narrowly, and she seemed conscious of his scrutiny, for she turned her head away and busied herself in adjustment of the bed-clothes. Then he laughed a little mocking laugh, and proceeded to give directions for the treatment of their patient.
"You must watch him," he insisted, and though she muttered, "you needn't tell me that!" finished his say without noticing the interruption. "You must watch him narrowly; if he wakes, give him one more spoonful of the cordial; if he is restless after that, come to me. If he wanders in his sleep mark every word he utters, and remember it. Such drivellings are not of the slightest importance, but interesting, very interesting, in a medical point of view. Good-night, Waif. Do exactly as I bid you, and if all goes well, do not wake me till sunrise."
Then he trimmed the lamp, listened at the lattice, and retired, leaving the girl alone with her patient.
How quiet she sat! moving not so much as a finger, with her large dark eyes fixed on the floor, and her thoughts like restless sea-birds flying here, there, everywhere; now skimming the Past, now soaring into the Future, finally gathering out of all quarters to settle themselves on the Present. From the moment when Katerfelto, or the Patron, as she called him, left the room, she seemed to have entered on a new life, to have risen in her own esteem, to have accepted responsibilities of which she was proud, to have become a gentler, fairer, softer being, more susceptible to pleasure and to pain. She only knew there was a great change; she did not know that she was passing into Fairy Land by the gate through which there is no return.
Behind her lay rugged mountain and dreary moor, paths that soil and blister weary feet, barren uplands yielding scanty harvest in return for daily toil, a scorching sun, a drenching rain, mocking winds that whirl, and buffet, and moan. Before her opened the dazzling vistas of a magic region: gleaming rivers, golden skies, velvet lawns fretted with gems, bending flowers laden with perfume; glade and thicket, field and forest bathed in glows of unearthly beauty, rich in tints of unearthly splendour, teeming with fruits of unearthly hues. Would she not enter in and rest? Would she not reach forth her hand to gather, and smell, and taste? Had she not wild longings, vague curiosity, unreasonable daring? Was she not a woman to the core? How could she tell that the Fairy Land was a glamour, the lustre a delusion, the beauty a snare? that serpents were coiling in the grass, that poison lurked in the flowers, that the fruits turned to dust and ashes on the lip? How could she foresee the time when she would yearn and strive and pray to get back to the outer world? In vain! Those who have once passed its gate and tasted the fruits in that fairy garden have to do with middle earth no more. Their phantoms may indeed remain among us, but themselves are far away in the enchanted country, pacing their weary round without a respite, fulfilling their endless penance in the listless apathy of despair.