“He might prescribe,” returned the lady, who was also one of Dr. West’s adherents. “You can tell him her symptoms, and he can order medicine.”
“Thank you; I never thought of that. I’ll go at once,” John said; and bareheaded as he was, he crossed the street, and was soon knocking at Mrs. Markham’s door.
“The doctor’s worse,” she said, in reply to his inquiry. “He seems terribly excited, and acts as if he was possessed.”
“But I must see him,” Squire John continued. “Miss Freeman is very sick, and he must prescribe.”
“Ain’t there no wedding after all? Wall, if that don’t beat me!” was Mrs. Markham’s response, as she carried to Dr. West the message which roused him from the hopeless, despairing mood into which he had fallen.
He had insisted upon sitting up by the window, where he could watch the proceedings across the street, and as Robert did not return, while one after another the invited guests went up the walk into the house, he gave up all as lost, and sick with the crushing belief, went back to his bed, whispering sadly:
“Dora is not for me. But God knows best!”
He did not see the bridegroom coming to his door, but when the message was delivered it diffused new life at once.
“Yes, show him up; I must talk with him,” he said, and a moment after Squire John stood before his rival, his honest face full of anxiety, and almost bedewed with tears as he stated all he knew of Dora’s case. “If I could see her I could do so much better,” Richard said; “but that is impossible to-day, so I must send,” and with hands which shook as they had never shaken before, he gave out the medicine which he hoped might save Dora’s life.
“If you were able to go,” the Squire said, as he stood in the doorway, “I would carry you myself; but perhaps it is not prudent.”