By a strong effort, Mr Renshawe regained his simulated composure, and in reply to Dr Garland's professional inquiry, as to the state of his health, said with a forced laugh: 'My friend, Waters, has, I suppose, been amusing you with the absurd story that made him stare so last night. It is exceedingly droll, I must say, although many persons, otherwise acute enough, cannot, except upon reflection, comprehend a jest. There was John Kemble, the tragedian, for instance, who'——
'Never mind John Kemble, my dear sir,' interrupted Dr Garland. 'Do, pray, tell us the story over again. I love an amusing jest.'
Mr Renshawe hesitated for an instant, and then said with reserve, almost dignity of manner: 'I do not know, sir'—his face, by the way, was determinedly averted from the cool, searching gaze of the physician—'I do not know, sir, that I am obliged to find you in amusement; and as your presence here was not invited, I shall be obliged by your leaving the room as quickly as maybe.'
'Certainly—certainly, sir. I am exceedingly sorry to have intruded, but I am sure you will permit me to have a peep at this wonderful portrait.'
Renshawe sprang impulsively forward to prevent the doctor reaching it. He was too late; and Dr Garland, turning sharply round with the painting in his hand, literally transfixed him in an attitude of surprise and consternation. Like the Ancient Mariner, he held him by his glittering eye, but the spell was not an enduring one. 'Truly,' remarked Dr Garland, as he found the kind of mesmeric influence he had exerted beginning to fail, 'not so very bad a chance resemblance; especially about the eyes and mouth'——
'This is very extraordinary conduct,' broke in Mr Renshawe; 'and I must again request that you will both leave the room.'
It was useless to persist, and we almost immediately went away. 'Your impression, Mr Waters,' said the physician as he was leaving the house, 'is, I daresay, the true one; but he is on his guard now, and it will be prudent to wait for a fresh outbreak before acting decisively; more especially as the hallucination appears to be quite a harmless one.'
This was not, I thought, quite so sure, but of course I acquiesced, as in duty bound; and matters went on pretty much as usual for seven or eight weeks, except that Mr Renshawe manifested much aversion towards myself personally, and at last served me with a written notice to quit at the end of the term previously stipulated for. There was still some time to that; and in the meanwhile, I caused a strict watch to be set, as far as was practicable, without exciting observation, upon our landlord's words and acts.
Ellen Irwin's first tumult of grief subsided, the next and pressing question related to her own and infant son's subsistence. An elderly man of the name of Tomlins was engaged as foreman; and it was hoped the business might still be carried on with sufficient profit. Mr Renshawe's manner, though at times indicative of considerable nervous irritability, was kind and respectful to the young widow; and I began to hope that the delusion he had for awhile laboured under had finally passed away.
The hope was a fallacious one. We were sitting at tea on a Sunday evening, when Mrs Irwin, pale and trembling with fright and nervous agitation, came hastily in with her little boy in her hand. I correctly divined what had occurred. In reply to my hurried questioning, the astounded young matron told me in substance, that within the last two or three days Mr Renshawe's strange behaviour and disjointed talk had both bewildered and alarmed her. He vaguely intimated that she, Ellen Irwin, was really Laura somebody else—that she had kept company with him, Mr Renshawe, in Yorkshire, before she knew poor George—with many other strange things he muttered rather than spoke out; and especially that it was owing to her son reminding her continually of his father, that she pretended not to have known Mr Renshawe twelve or thirteen years ago. 'In short,' added the young woman with tears and blushes, 'he is utterly crazed; for he asked me just now to marry him—which I would not do for the Indies—and is gone away in a passion to find a paper that will prove, he says, I am that other Laura something.'