“Don’t ask, Leo,” said the curate, with a groan.
“Poor Mary!” said Leo, with a sigh, but she did not seem stirred. There were no tears in her eyes, and she might have been making inquiry about the health of some parishioner.
So North thought.
“I’ll go up and sit with her now, Hartley,” she said quickly, and turned to leave the room, when Horace North’s eyes became fixed upon a white mark at the back of the young girl’s sleeve – a mark which looked exactly as if her arm had been held by some one wearing a well pipe-clayed glove.
The next moment the young girl, the dark sleeve, and the white mark had passed from Horace North’s sight, and soon after from his mind.
Chapter Ten.
The Doctor Prescribes
“There, my dear, I shall give you up now,” said North one day, about three months after the accident. “Ah! you look bad!”
Mary was downstairs, lying back in an easy-chair, and she coloured slightly, and there was a faint gathering of wrinkles on her white forehead at his easy-going, paternal way.
“Yes,” said Mary. “Do advise him, doctor. He is far from well.”
“Yes; he’s a bad colour,” said North bluffly.
“Hadn’t you better suggest that I should be painted?” said the curate tartly.
“Another bad sign,” said North, with a good-tempered look at Mary. “He talks to his old friend in that way. Bile, Miss Salis – bile.”
“It’s bother, not bile,” cried the curate sharply. “I beg your pardon, old fellow.”
“Granted. But what’s the matter?”
“Everything. I’m troubled about the church matters. The squire is rector’s churchwarden, and somehow we don’t get on.”
“That’s a wonder,” said the doctor drily.
“Then, I’m in trouble with the rector.”
“Why, what’s he got to say for himself? He’s nearly always in London, so as to be within reach of his club. It isn’t time for him to come down and give us another of his sermons, is it?”
“No. It isn’t about that.”
“What then?”
“Oh! nothing.”
“Come, out with it!”
The curate glanced at Mary, who shook her head slightly, but he went on.
“The fact is, old fellow, May takes upon himself to write me most unpleasant, insolent letters. He learns from some mischief-making body that Leo hunts, and I never hear the last of it.”
“Humph! Why not put a stop to it, and sell the mare?”
The curate shook his head.
“I don’t like her,” said the doctor. “She’ll be getting your sister into some fresh scrape.”
“Don’t talk like that, man. She has done mischief enough. What nonsense! Leo can do anything she likes with her now.”
“Glad to hear it; and now I want to do what I like with you.”
“So you do,” said the curate good-humouredly.
“Not quite. You’re horribly snappish. Sure sign of being a little out of order. I shall prescribe for you.”
“Do,” said Salis grimly, “and I’ll take the medicine and poison some one else with it.”
“No need; plenty of people are doing that. Now, look here, you worry yourself too much about everyday matters.”
“Nonsense!”
“It is quite true, Mr North,” said Mary, smiling.
“There, sir, you hear. Then you don’t take enough exercise.”
“Indeed, but I do. I spend half my time going about.”
“Visiting the poor,” cried the doctor. “Harassing yourself with other folks’ troubles, and listening to endless stories of worry.”
“Yes, Mr North, quite true.”
“What nonsense, Mary!” cried the curate piteously. “I must do my duty.”
“Of course, my dear sir, so do it; but don’t overdo it. Recipe – ”
“I won’t take it,” said the curate.
“Miss Salis here shall make you, sir. Recipe: ‘One good cigar or two pipes of bird’s-eye per diem, and three hours to be spent in gardening or fishing every day.’”
Mary’s eyes brightened in forgetfulness of her own trouble as she rejoiced in the advice given to her brother.
“It’s all rubbish, North. I’ve no time to give to fishing or gardening. As to the cigar, I might manage that.”
“Pills no use without the draught,” said the doctor.
“But you a doctor, and prescribe tobacco – a poison!”
“Does people good to poison them a little when they’re out of order.”
“But May grumbles as it is, and is never satisfied. What will he say if he hears of my smoking, and pottering about with a fishing-rod?”
“Tell May to mind his points at whist and leave us alone. There, I must be off. Take my advice, too, about the mare. I shall always hate her for the injury she did to poor Miss Salis here. Good-bye, both of you.”
“Stop a minute,” said the curate. “What about yourself?”
“Well, what about myself?”
“The great idea – the crotchet – the cr – ”
“Well, say it – the craze, man! Every inventor is considered a lunatic till his invention works. Wait, my dear fellow – wait. I may astonish you yet. Good-bye, Miss Salis.”
He shook hands, and left the Rectory-parlour with Salis, the saddle creaking loudly as he mounted and then rode away.
“Good fellow, Horace,” sighed the curate, “but only fit for a West End practice, among people with plenty of time and money. I fancy myself smoking on the river bank, throwing flies and pitching in ground bait. It’s absurd!”
“Poor Miss Salis!” said Mary to herself, as she repeated the doctor’s sympathetic, pitying words; and it was forced upon her more and more plainly in what light he regarded her. She was his patient – nothing more. No; this was unjust, for he always treated her most warmly – as a friend – almost as a sister.
But her old hopes and aspirations seemed to be dead for ever, without promise of revival.
At that moment the curate returned.
“Poor Leo!” he said. “I could not do that,” as he again thought of how attached she had become to the mare, and how the handsome little creature had seemed to divert her attention from the past.
“It would not do, Mary,” he said aloud. “Poor girl! I seem to have been very hard upon her about Tom Candlish, and it would be too bad to deprive her of the mare.”
“She appears very fond of it,” said Mary gravely.
“And the more fond she gets of it the less she thinks about anything else, eh?” Mary was silent.
“She never mentions him to you now?”
“No, Hartley.”
“Hah! That’s a good job. It was hard work and painful; but I nipped that in the bud.”
Mary was silent, and looked at her brother uneasily.
“Well, what is it, dear? Not comfortable?”
“Yes, Hartley,