A Life for a Life, Volume 2 (of 3) (eBook)

Dinah Maria Mulock Craik (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2017 | 1. Auflage
468 Seiten
OTB eBook publishing (Verlag)
978-3-95864-916-3 (ISBN)

Infos

Excerpt: “I am not, the least in the world which I would fain have explained, only mere friends can never understand the ins and outs of a family. If I offered to assist her in the house, how Penelope would stare Or even in her schools and parish--but that I cannot do. Teaching is to me perfectly intolerable. The moment I have to face two dozen pairs of round eyes, every particle of sense takes flight, and I become the veriest of cowards, ready to sink through the floor. The same, too, in district visiting. What business have I, because I happen to be the clergyman's daughter, to go lifting the latch, and poking about poor people's houses, obliging them to drop me curtseys, and receive civilly my tracts and advice--which they neither read nor follow, and might be none the better for it if they did.”

Textauszug

CHAPTER II. HIS STORY.

I have not been able to continue this. Every day has been full of business, and every night I have spent at Rockmount for the last three weeks.

Such was, I solemnly aver—from no fixed intention: I meant only to go as an ordinary doctor—in order, if possible, to serve the life that was valuable in itself, and most precious to some few; afterwards, whichever way the case terminated, to take my leave, like any other medical attendant: receiving thanks, or fee. Yes—if they offered it, I determined to take a fee; in order to show, both to them and myself, that I was only the doctor—the paid physician. But this last wound has been spared me—and I only name it now in proof that nothing has happened as I expected or intended.

I remember Dallas, in reading to me the sermons he used to write for practice, preparing for the sacred duties which, to him, never came—had one upon the text “Thy will be done,”—where, in words more beautiful than I dare try to repeat in mine, he explained how good it was for us that things so seldom fell out according to our shortsighted plannings; how many a man had lived to bless God that his own petty will had not been done; that nothing had happened to him according as he expected or intended.

Do you know, you to whom I write, how much it means, my thus naming to you of Dallas—whose name, since he died, has never but once passed my lips.

I think you would have liked my brother Dallas. He was not at all like me—I took after my father, people said, and he after our mother. He had soft, English features, and smooth, fine, dark hair. He was smaller than I, though so much the elder. The very last Christmas we had at St. Andrews, I mind lifting him up and carrying him several yards in play, laughing at him for being as thin and light as a lady. We were merry-hearted fellows, and had many a joke, the two of us, when we were together. Strange to think, that I am a man nigh upon forty, and that he has been dead twenty years.

It is you—little as you guess it, who have made me think upon these my dead, my father, mother, and Dallas, whom I have never dared to think of until now. Let me continue.

Mr. Johnston’s has been a difficult case—more so in its secondary stages than at first. I explained this to his daughter—the second daughter; the only one whom I found of much assistance. Miss Johnston being extremely nervous, and irritable, and Mrs. Treherne, whom I trusted would have taken her share in the nursing, proving more of a hindrance than a help. She could not be made to comprehend why, when her father was out of danger, she should not rush in and out of the sick room continually, with her chattering voice, and her noisy silk dresses. And she was offended because, when Mr. Charteris, having come for a day from London, was admitted, quiet, scared, and shocked, to spend a few minutes by the old man’s bed-side—her Augustus, full of lively rattle and rude animal spirits, was carefully kept out of the room.

“You plan it all between you,” she said, one day, half sulkily, to her sister and myself. “You play into one another’s hands as if you had lived together all your lives. Confess, Doctor,—confess, Miss Nurse, you would keep me too out of papa’s room, if you could.”

I certainly would. Though an excellent person, kind-hearted and good-tempered to a degree, Mrs. Treherne contrived to try my temper more than I should like to say, for two intolerable days.

The third, I resolved on a little conversation with Miss Theodora; who, having sat up till my watch began at two, now came in to me while I was taking breakfast, to receive my orders for the day. These were simple enough; quiet, silence; and, except old Mrs. Cartwright, whom I had sent for, only one person to be allowed in my patient’s room.

“Ah, yes, I’m glad of that. Just hearken!” Doors slamming—footsteps on the stairs—Mrs. Treherne calling out to her husband not to smoke in the hall.—“That is how it is all day, when you are away. What can I do? Help me, please, help me!”

An entreaty, almost childish in its earnestness; now and then, through all this time, she has seemed in her behaviour towards me, less like a woman than a trusting dependant child.

I sent for Treherne and his wife, and told them that the present was a matter of life and death, in which there could be no standing upon ceremony; that in this house, where no legitimate rule existed, and all were young and inexperienced, I, as the physician, must have authority, which authority must be obeyed. If they wished, I would resign the case altogether—but I soon saw that was not desired. They promised obedience; and I repeated the medical orders, adding, that during my absence, only one person, the person I chose, should be left in charge of my patient.

“Very well, Doctor,” said Mrs. Treherne, “and that is—”

“Miss Theodora.”

“Theodora—oh, nonsense! She never nursed anybody. She never was fit for anything.”

“She is fit for all I require, and her father wishes for her also; therefore, if you please, will you at once go up to him, Miss Theodora?”

She had stood patient and impassive till I spoke, then the colour rushed into her face and the tears into her eyes. She left the room immediately.

But, as I went, she was lying in wait for me at the door. “Thank you—thank you so much! But do you really think I shall make a good careful nurse for dear papa?”

I told her “Certainly—better than any one else here—better indeed than anyone I knew.”

It was good to see her look of happy surprise.

“Do you really think that? Nobody ever thought so well of me before. I will try—ah! won’t I try, to deserve your good opinion.”

Ignorant, simple heart.

Most people have some other person, real or imaginary, who is more “comfortable” to them than anyone else—to whom in trouble the thoughts always first fly, who in sickness would be chosen to smooth the weary pillow, and holding whose hand they would like to die. Now, it would be quite easy, quite happy to die in a certain chamber I know, shadowy and still, with a carpet of a green leafy pattern, and bunches of fuchsias papering the walls. And about the room, a little figure moving; slender, noiseless, busy and sweet—in a brown dress, soft to touch, and making no sound, with a white collar fastened by a little coloured bow above it; the delicate throat and small head like a deer’s; and the eyes something like a deer’s eyes also, which turn round large and quiet, to look you right in the face—as they did then.

I wonder if any accident or illness were to happen to me here, while staying in the camp—something that would make it certain I had only a few days, or hours, to live, and I happened to have sufficient consciousness and will to say what I wished done, whom I desired to see, in those few last hours, when the longing of a dying man could injure nobody,—Enough—this is the merest folly. To live, not to die, is likely to be my portion I accept it—blame me not.

Day after day has gone on in the same round—my ride to Rockmount after dusk, tea there, and my evening sleep in “the Doctor’s room.” There, at midnight, Treherne wakes me—I dress and return to that quiet chamber where the little figure rises from beside the bed with a smile and a whisper—“Not at all tired, thank you.” A few words more, and I give it my candle, bid it good night, and take its place, sitting down in the same armchair, and leaning my head back against the same cushion, which still keeps the indentation, soft and warm; and so I watch by the old man till morning.

This is how it has regularly been.

Until lately, night was the patient’s most trying time. He used to lie moaning, or watching the shadows of the fire-light on the curtains. Sometimes, when I gave him food or medicine, turning upon me with a wild stare, as if he hardly knew me, or thought I was someone else. Or he would question me vaguely as to where was Dora?—and would I take care that she had a good long sleep—poor Dora!

Dora—Theodora—“the gift of God,”—it is good to have names with meanings to them, though people so seldom resemble their names. Her father seems beginning to feel that she is not unlike hers.

“She is a good girl, Doctor,” he said one evening, when, after having safely borne moving from bed to his arm-chair, I pronounced my patient convalescent, and his daughter was sent to take tea and spend the evening downstairs, “she is a very good girl. Perhaps I have never thought of my daughters.”

I answered vaguely, daughters were a great blessing—often more so than sons.

“You are right, sir,” he said suddenly, after a few minutes’ pause. “You were never married I believe?”

“No.”

“If you do marry—never long for a son. Never build your hopes on him—trusting he will keep up your name, and be the stay of your old age. I had one boy, sir; he was more to me than all my daughters.”

A desperate question was I prompted to ask—I could not withhold it—though the old man’s agitated countenance showed that it must be one passing question only.

“Is your son living?”

“No. He died young.”

This, then, must be the secret—simple and plain enough. He was “a boy”—he died “young,” perhaps about eighteen or nineteen—the age when boys are most prone to run wild. This lad must have done so; putting all the circumstances together, the conclusion was obvious, that in some way or other he had, before his death, or in...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 30.11.2017
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Klassiker / Moderne Klassiker
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Romane / Erzählungen
• ISBN-10: 3-95864-916-5 / 3958649165
• ISBN-13: 978-3-95864-916-3 / 9783958649163