When the footman opened the door, Benjulia handed in the packet of letters. After his latest experience of Mrs. Gallilee, he had no intention of returning her visit. He walked away without uttering a word.
The cable took his message to Mr. Morphew in these terms:—“Ovid’s patient at Montreal. Was the complaint brain disease? Yes or no.” Having made arrangements for the forwarding of the reply from his club, he set forth on the walk back to his house.
At five minutes to three, he was at home again. As the clock struck the hour, he rang the bell. The man-servant appeared, without the dinner. Benjulia’s astonishing amiability—on his holiday—was even equal to this demand on its resources.
“I ordered roast mutton at three,” he said, with terrifying tranquillity. “Where is it?”
“The dinner will be ready in ten minutes, sir.”
“Why is it not ready now?”
“The cook hopes you will excuse her, sir. She is a little behindhand to-day.”
“What has hindered her, if you please?”
The silent servant—on all other occasions the most impenetrable of human beings—began to tremble. The doctor had, literally, kicked a man out of the house who had tried to look through the laboratory skylight. He had turned away a female servant at half an hour’s notice, for forgetting to shut the door, a second time in one day. But what were these highhanded proceedings, compared with the awful composure which, being kept waiting for dinner, only asked what had hindered the cook, and put the question politely, by saying, “if you please”?
“Perhaps you were making love to her?” the doctor suggested, as gently as ever.