"I cannot help thinking that if George Atkinson were applied to, he would give you a post in his bank. He ought to do it. After turning you out of Eagles' Nest——"
"I wouldn't apply to him; I wouldn't take it," interrupted Charles, fiercely, his anger aroused by the name. "If he offered me the best post in it to-morrow, I would fling it back in his face. Good-night, Edina: I'm off. I don't care to stay to hear of suggested obligations from him."
On the day of Edina's departure for Trennach, the morning post brought Colonel Cockburn's answer to Charles. It was very short. Edina, her bonnet on, stood to read it over his shoulder. The colonel intimated that he did not quite comprehend Charles's application; but would see him on his return to London.
"So there's nothing for it but to wait—and I hope he won't be long," remarked Charles, as he folded the briefly-worded letter. "You must see there's nothing else, Edina."
[CHAPTER IX.]
MR. MAX BROWN
In a populous and somewhat obscure part of Lambeth, not a hundred miles away from the great hospital, Bedlam, there ran a narrow street. Amongst the shops, on the left of this street in going from London, stood a house that could not strictly be called a shop now; though it had been one recently, and the two counters within it still remained. It had formerly been a small chemist's shop. About a year ago, a young medical man named Brown had taken it, done away with the drugs and chemicals, so far as retailing them to the public went, and there set himself up as a doctor. He dispensed his own medicines, so the counters were useful still, and his jars of powders and liquids occupied the pigeon-holes above, where the chemist's jars had once stood. The lower half of the windows had been stained white; on one of them was written in black letters, "Mr. Max Brown, surgeon;" on the other, "Mr. Max Brown, general medical practitioner."
It was now about a year since Mr. Max Brown had thus established himself; and he had done very fairly. If his practice did not afford a promise that he would speedily become a millionaire, it at least was sufficient to keep him. And to keep him well. Mr. Brown had himself been born and reared in as crowded a part of London as this, somewhere towards Clerkenwell, therefore the locality did not offend his tastes. He anticipated remaining in it for good, and had not the slightest doubt that his practice would steadily increase, and afford him a carriage and a better house in time. The tradespeople around, though far below those of Bond Street in the social scale, were tradespeople of sufficient substance, and could afford to pay Mr. Brown. He was a little dark man, of affable nature and manners, clever in his profession, liked by his patients, and winning his way more surely amongst them day by day.
In the midst of this humble prosperity a check occurred. Not to the prosperity, but to Mr. Brown's plans and projects. Several years before, his elder brother had gone to the West Indies, and his widowed mother and his sister had subsequently followed him out. The sister had married there. The brother, Kenneth Brown, was for some years successful manager of a planter's estate; he now managed one of his own. Altogether they were extremely prosperous; and the only one of the family left in England, Max, received pleasant letters from them by each fortnightly mail, and was quite at ease with regard to them. It therefore took him completely by surprise in the midst of this ease, to find himself suddenly summoned to Jamaica.
One day in this same hot summer, early in the month of June—for we must go back two or three weeks in our story—Mr. Brown, having completed his morning round of calls on patients, stood behind his counter making up the physic required by them, and waiting for his queer old maid-servant, Eve, to come and tell him his one-o'clock dinner was ready. The door stood open to the hot street, and to the foot-passengers traversing the pavement; and Sam, the young boy, was waiting at the opposite counter with his covered basket until the physic should be ready.