"And what are these signs of a morbid tendency that you spoke of?" asked the doctor.
"Well, in the first place, after being almost extravagant in his devotion to my daughter, Doreen, he now neglects her outrageously—comes down very seldom, writes short letters or none. Now, my daughter is not the sort of girl that a sane man would neglect," added Doctor Wedmore, proudly.
"Certainly not," assented the doctor, inwardly thinking that it was much less surprising than it would have been in the case of one of his own girls.
"In the second place, he is always harping upon the subject of Jacobs and his peculations—an old subject, which he might well let rest. And, in the third place, he has become moody, morose and absent-minded; and my son, Max, who often visits him at his chambers in Lincoln's Inn, has noticed the change even more than I, who have fewer opportunities of seeing him."
The doctor was puffing stolidly at his pipe and looking at the fire.
"It is very difficult to form an opinion upon report only," said he. "Frankly, I can see nothing in what you have told me about the young man which could not be explained in other and likelier ways. He may have got entangled, for instance, with some woman in London."
Mr. Wedmore took fire at this suggestion.
"In that case, the sooner Doreen forgets all about him the better."
"Mind, I'm only suggesting!" put in the doctor, hastily. "There may be a dozen more reasons—"
"I shall not wait to find them out," said Mr. Wedmore, decisively. "He and Max are coming down together this evening. My wife would have them to help in organizing some affair they're getting up for Christmas. I'll send him to the right-about without any more nonsense."
"But surely that is hardly—"
"Hardly what?" snapped out Mr. Wedmore, as he poked the fire viciously.
"Well, hardly fair to either of the young people. Put a few questions to him yourself, or better still, let your wife do it. It may be only a storm in a teacup, after all. Remember, he is the son of your old friend. And you wouldn't like to have it on your conscience that you had treated him harshly."
The doctor's advice was sane and sound enough, but Mr. Wedmore was not in the mood to listen to it. That notion of an entanglement with another woman rankled in his proud mind, and made him still less inclined to be patient and forbearing.
"I shall give Doreen warning of what I am going to do at once," said he, "before Horne turns up."
The doctor shrugged his shoulders. He was obstinate himself.
Mr. Wedmore crossed the long room to the door, and opened it sharply.
The hall was full of people and of great bales of goods, which were piled upon the center-table and heaped up all around it.
"Doreen!" he called, sharply.
Out of the crowd there rushed a girl—such a girl! One of those radiant creatures who explain the cult of womanhood; who make it difficult even for sober-minded, middle-aged men and matrons to realize that this is nothing but flesh and blood like themselves; one of those beautiful creatures who claim worship as a right and who repay it with kindness and brightness and sweetness and laughter.
No house was ever dull that held Doreen Wedmore.
She was a tall girl, brown-haired, brown-eyed, made to laugh and to live in the sunshine. Nobody could resist her, and nobody ever tried to.
She sprang across the hall to her father and whirled him back into the dining-room, and put her back against it.
"Dudley's come!" said she. "He's in the hall—among the blankets!"
"Blankets!"
"Yes." She was crossing the room by this time to the doctor, whom she had quickly perceived, and was holding out her hand to him. "You must know, doctor, that we are up to our eyes in blankets just now, and in bundles of red flannel, and in soup and coals. Papa has been reading up Christmas in the country in the olden time, and he finds that to be correct you must deluge the neighborhood with those articles. They are not at all what the people want, as far as I can make out. But that doesn't matter. It pleases papa to demoralize the neighborhood; so we're doing it. And mamma helps him. She dates from the prehistoric period when a wife really swore to obey her husband; so she does it through thick and thin. Of course, she knows better all the time. She could always set papa right if she chose. Whatever happens, papa must be obeyed. So when he wants to run his dear old head into a noose, she dutifully holds it open for him, when all the time she knows how uncomfortable he'll be till he gets out."
"You're a saucy puss, Miss!" cried her father, trying to frown, but betraying his delight in his daughter's merry tongue by the twinkle in his eyes.
"And that's the right sort of woman for a wife," said the old doctor, enthusiastically. "I must say I think it's a bad sign when young girls think they can improve upon their own mothers."
"She doesn't mean half she says," said her father, indulgently.
"Oh, yes, she does," retorted Doreen. "And she wants to know, please, what it is you have to say to Dudley."
The doctor rose from his chair, and Mr. Wedmore frowned.
"And it's no use putting me off by telling me not to ask questions. I'm not mamma, you know."
"I intend to ask him—something about you."
It was the girl's turn to frown now.
"Please don't, papa," said she, in a lower voice. "I know you're going to worry him, and to put your hands behind your back and ask him conundrums, and to make all sorts of mischief, under the impression that you are putting things right. And if you only just wouldn't, everything would soon be as right as possible. While if you persist—"
But Mr. Wedmore interrupted her, not harshly, as he would have done anybody else, but with decision.
"You must trust me to know best, my dear. It is better for you both that we should come to some understanding. Haselden, you'll excuse me for half an hour, won't you? And you, Doreen," and he turned again to his daughter, "stay with the doctor here, and try to talk sense till I come back again."
And Mr. Wedmore went quickly out of the room, without giving the girl a chance of saying anything more.
CHAPTER II.