This eBook was produced by Andrew Heath
and David Widger
The next day I had just dismissed the last of my visiting patients, andwas about to enter my carriage and commence my round, when I receiveda twisted note containing but these words:—
Call on me to-day, as soon as you can.
M. Poyntz.
A few minutes afterwards I was in Mrs. Poyntz's drawing-room.
"Well, Allen Fenwick" said she, "I do not serve friends by halves. Nothanks! I but adhere to a principle I have laid down for myself. I spentlast evening with the Ashleighs. Lilian is certainly much altered,—very weak, I fear very ill, and I believe very unskilfuly treated by Dr.Jones. I felt that it was my duty to insist on a change of physician; butthere was something else to consider before deciding who that physicianshould be. I was bound, as your confidante, to consult your own scruplesof honour. Of course I could not say point-blank to Mrs. Ashleigh, 'Dr.Fenwick admires your daughter, would you object to him as a son-in-law?'Of course I could not touch at all on the secret with which you intrustedme; but I have not the less arrived at a conclusion, in agreement with myprevious belief, that not being a woman of the world, Annie Ashleigh hasnone of the ambition which women of the world would conceive for adaughter who has a good fortune and considerable beauty; that herpredominant anxiety is forher child's happiness, and her predominantfear is that her child will die. She would never oppose any attachmentwhich Lilian might form; and if that attachment were for one who hadpreserved her daughter's life, I believe her own heart would gratefullygo with her daughter's. So far, then, as honour is concerned, allscruples vanish."
I sprang from my seat, radiant with joy. Mrs. Poyntz drylycontinued: "You value yourself on your common-sense, and to that I addressa few words of counsel which may not be welcome to your romance. I saidthat I did not think you and Lilian would suit each other in the long run;reflection confirms me in that supposition. Do not look at me soincredulously and so sadly. Listen, and take heed. Ask yourself what, asa man whose days are devoted to a laborious profession, whose ambition isentwined with its success, whose mind must be absorbed in itspursuits,—ask yourself what kind of a wife you would have sought to win;had not this sudden fancy for a charming face rushed over your betterreason, and obliterated all previous plans and resolutions. Surely someone with whom your heart would have been quite at rest; by whom yourthoughts would have been undistracted from the channels into which yourcalling should concentrate their flow; in short, a serene companion in thequiet holiday of a trustful home! Is it not so?"
"You interpret my own thoughts when they have turned towards marriage.But what is there in Lilian Ashleigh that should mar the picture you havedrawn?"
"What is there in Lilian Ashleigh which in the least accords with thepicture? In the first place, the wife of a young physician should not behis perpetual patient. The more he loves her, and the more worthy she maybe of love, the more her case will haunt him wherever he goes. When hereturns home, it is not to a holiday; the patient he most cares for, theanxiety that most gnaws him, awaits him there."
"But, good heavens! why should Lilian Ashleigh be a perpetual patient?
The sanitary resources of youth are incalculable. And—"
"Let me stop you; I cannot argue against a physician in love! I willgive