“I have been here since five o’clock, sir. ’Twas I sent off the message. The dog cart is waiting at the gate, and if you please, sir, I was to say as Miss Cicely—my master, I should say,—hoped you’d excuse the dog-cart instead of a close carriage; the road from here to the Abbey is terrible bad just now, and a heavy carriage would have taken twice as long,” said the man, as he led the way through the station-gate to where a two-wheeled vehicle and an impatient-looking horse stood ready for them.
“I prefer it, thank you,” said Mr. Guildford good-naturedly. Like many self-contained people, he had a liking for a frank manner on the part of others, especially perhaps when they were his inferiors.
“You see, sir,” continued the man, “I was hurried both ways, first to get the telegram off, and then to get you to the Abbey when you came.”
His remarks were interrupted by the zeal with which he set to work to tuck Mr. Guildford up in the rugs, of which there appeared a profusion.
“Miss Cicely—leastways my master, I should say, though for that matter it were Miss Cicely, she never forgets nothing,—she told me as I were to be sure to bring plenty of wraps,” he observed, his language becoming comfortably ungrammatical as he felt himself growing at ease with the “strange doctor.”
“Thank you, that will do capitally,” said Mr. Guildford, as they started off at a brisk pace. “But it doesn’t seem to me as cold here as at Sothernbay, or is there a change in the weather?” he added, glancing up at the sky, in which but few stars were visible.
“Bless you, sir! yes to be sure, there’s a thaw,” said the servant eagerly; “it began this afternoon. We was all so glad, thinking it might be better for little master. Shouldn’t you think so, sir?” he asked with an anxiety in his voice that Mr. Guildford could not understand.
“I have not heard who it is that is ill, my good fellow,” he said kindly; “is ‘little master’ the patient? I am all in the dark, you see; I know nothing except what was in the telegram you sent off.”
“Of course not, sir, of course not,” exclaimed the man. “You see, sir, we’ve been thinking of little else all these days, and it seemed like as if every one must be the same. Yes, sir, it’s little master, bless him! as is ill; it begun with the croup, he’s had that many a time; many a night Miss Cicely has called me up to fetch the old doctor—there’s a bell rings into my room on purpose,—but this time it’s turned to worse. I can’t exactly say what it is. Miss Cicely’s never closed a eye these three nights, Mrs. Moore told me; I’m afraid he’s very bad. But now you’ve come, and the break in the weather, he’ll pull through; don’t you think so, sir?” he inquired wistfully, as if the question of life or death hung upon the opinion it was utterly impossible for Mr. Guildford to express.
“You forget, my good fellow,” said the doctor again, “you forget I have not yet seen the poor little boy; but of one thing you may be sure, I shall do my very best.”