Edina: A Novel

by Mrs. Henry Wood

Frank agreed to all: the terms were first-rate; just what he should have chosen, he said. And surely to him they looked so. He was suddenly lifted out of his state of penniless dependence, had a house over his head, and occupation. The very fact of possessing a home to bring Daisy to, would have lent enchantment to the view in his sanguine nature.

"And by good luck I shall dodge the Tiger," he assured himself. "He will never think of looking for me here. Were he to find me out, Mr. Blase Pellet would be down upon me for hush-money—for that I expect will be his move the moment he thinks I have any money in my pocket. Yes, better to be in this obscure place at present, than flourishing before the West-end world as a royal physician."

So when preliminaries were arranged he wrote to Mrs. Raynor, saying what a jolly thing he had dropped into.

But Mr. Max Brown reconsidered one item in the arrangement. Instead of Frank's coming in when he left, he had him there a week beforehand that he might introduce him to the patients. Frank was to take to the old servant, Eve, and to the boy, Sam: in short, nothing was to be altered, nothing changed excepting the master. Frank was to walk in and Mr. Brown to walk out; all else was to go on as before. Mr. Brown made no sort of objection to Frank's wife sharing the home: on the contrary, he made one or two extra arrangements for her comfort. When he sailed, the beginning of July, Frank was fully installed, and Daisy might come as soon as she pleased. But her sister wished to keep her a little longer.

On one of the hot mornings in that same month of July, a well-dressed young fellow in deep mourning might be seen picking his way through the narrow streets of Lambeth, rendered ankle-deep in mud by the prodigal benevolence of the water-cart. It was Charles Raynor. Having nothing to do with his time, he had come forth to find out Frank.

"It can't be here!" cried Charley to himself, sniffing about fastidiously. "Frank would never take a practice in a low place like this! I say—here, youngster," he cried, arresting the steps of a tattered girl, who was running out of a shop, "do you chance to know where Mark Street is?"

"First turning you comes to," promptly responded the damsel, with assured confidence.

Charles found the turning and the street, and went down it, looking on all sides for the house he wanted. As he did not remember, or else did not know, the name of Frank's predecessor, the words "Mr. Max Brown" on some window-panes on the opposite side of the way afforded him no guide; and he might have gone on into endless wilds but for catching sight within the house of a shapely head and some bright hair, which he knew belonged to Frank. He crossed the street at a bound, and entered.

"Frank!"

Standing in the identical spot in which Max Brown was standing when we first saw him, was Frank, his head bent forward over an account-book, in which he was writing. He looked up hastily.