Doctor Hathern's daughters

by Mary Jane Holmes

It was not possible, though, as she had never known a real French woman, such as this unquestionably was.

“Why is the door fastened, keeping everybody out?” she asked, and the Colonel replied, “I don’t care to travel with Tom, Dick and Harry. I have engaged the whole compartment.”

That one could do this was new to Fanny, and she sank back into her seat with a feeling of dismay at the prospect of being shut up alone with her husband for three or four hours. She was beginning to be a little afraid of him. Not for anything he had done, but for something in the tone of his voice and the expression of his eyes, which seemed to be looking at her constantly until they made her almost as nervous as Jack’s had done when she was ill. When the train left the station and the Colonel resumed his paper she felt relieved, and began to look with curiosity and interest upon the lanes and hedges and gardens and houses they were passing so rapidly, and which, under the wintry sky, had none of the freshness and greenness she had associated with England. Gradually she became conscious that, instead of reading, her husband was watching her over the top of his paper, with something hard and cruel in his eyes which she could not understand. She knew nothing of what she had said in her delirium, or how bare she had laid her love and longing for Jack, and did not dream of the fierce jealousy and hatred of his rival filling her husband’s mind and making him see Jack written all over her face just as she had seen his eyes everywhere when the fever was upon her. At last, tired of the dreary landscape, and more tired of the scrutiny she could not fathom, she lay down among the cushions and rugs and fell into a dreamless sleep from which she did not fully rouse until they were entering the suburbs of London. Once, when they were stopping at a large town she was conscious that her husband said “Engaged” to some one, and of hearing the hum of disappointed voices outside. Again, she knew that a rug was thrown over her, and a window shade adjusted so as to shield her from any cold air which might find its way to her. He was certainly kind and she felt grateful for it, and when at last she was fully awake and sitting up, she gave him a smile so bright and beaming that he felt his pulse quicken, and the blue demons which had taken possession of him were less blue and tantalizing.

“I have had a splendid sleep. Where are we now?” she said, pushing the curtain away from the window which was covered with dirty splashes of rain.

“In London,” he replied, and Fanny became alert and interested in a moment.

To see London had been the dream of her life and one she had never expected to be realized. Now, she was here, and the outlook was dreary enough, with the yellow fog hanging low over the city,—the gas jets dimly shining through it,—the pools of water in the streets,—and the dirty streams mixed with coal dust and cinders falling from the roofs of the houses. All her old homesickness came back, and she felt utterly desolate and as if she wanted to be near someone. Taking her seat by her husband and leaning her head on his shoulder she said, “Oh, George, this is dreadful. London is ten times worse than New York ever thought of being.”

“It is a deuced nasty day, but it will not always be foggy,” he replied, as he busied himself with getting his bags and bundles together.

“No, it will not always be foggy, nor shall I always feel as I do now,” Fanny thought, and the natural hopefulness of her nature began to assert itself.

She was quite cheerful by the time the train ran into the St. Pancras Station and began to unload its passengers.

As she alighted from the carriage she ran against and nearly knocked down the little Frenchman, who was evidently trying to soothe and quiet his wife, if she were his wife. Her back was towards Fanny, who saw only the outline of her figure, and the coils of yellow hair under her hat. She was talking loudly and evidently greatly enraged, but as she spoke in French Fanny could not understand her. There was no more doubt that she was a virago than there was that the little man was the most patient and henpecked husband in the world. In response to Fanny’s, “I beg your pardon, sir,” as she ran against him, he took off his hat and said in broken English, “I you ask pardon, too, mademoiselle, to be so in your way.”