"A telegram, sir, for Dr. Wilmot," said the man, handing an envelope to Wilmot as he spoke; "just arrived from the station."
Wilmot tore open the envelope and read its enclosure--read it twice with frowning brow and sneering mouth; then handed it to his host, saying:
"A little too strong, that, eh? Is one never to be free from such intrusions? Do these people imagine that because I am a professional man I am to be always at their beck and call? Who is this Mr. Kilsyth, I wonder, who hails me as though I were a cabman on the rank?"
"Mr. Kilsyth, my dear fellow!" said Sir Saville, laughing; "I should like to see the face of any Highlander who heard you say that. Kilsyth of Kilsyth is the head of one of the oldest and most powerful clans in Aberdeenshire."
"I suppose he won't be powerful enough to have me shot, or speared, or 'hangit on a tree,' for putting his telegram into my pocket, and taking no further notice of it, for all that," said Wilmot.
"Do you mean to say that you intend to refuse his request, Chudleigh?"
"Most positively and decidedly, if request you call it. I confess it looks to me more like a command; and that's a style of thing I don't particularly affect, old friend."
"But do you see the facts? Miss Kilsyth is down with scarlet-fever--"
"Exactly. I'm very sorry, I'm sure, so far as one can be sorry for any one of whose existence one was a moment ago in ignorance; and I trust Miss Kilsyth will speedily recover; but it won't be through any aid of mine."
"My dear Chudleigh," said the old man gently, "you are all wrong about this. It's not a pleasant thing for me, as your host, to bid you go away; more especially as I had been looking forward with such pleasure to these few days' quiet with you. But I know it is the right thing for you to do; and why you should refuse, I cannot conceive. You seem to have taken umbrage at the style of the message; but even if one could be polite in a telegram, a father whose pet daughter is dangerously ill seldom stops to pick his words."
"But suppose I hadn't been here?"
"My dear friend, I decline to suppose anything of the sort. Suppose I had not been in the way when Sir Astley advised his late Majesty to call me in; I should still have been a successful man, it's true; but I should not have had the honour or the position I have, nor the wealth which enables me now to enjoy my ease, instead of slaving away still like--like some whom we know. No, no; drop your radicalism, I beseech you. You would go miles to attend to a sick gillie or a shepherd's orphan. Do the same for a very charming young girl, as I'm told,--Forbes knows her very well,--and for one of the best men in Scotland."
"Well, I suppose you're right, and I must go. It's an awful journey, isn't it?"
"Horses to the break, Donald; and tell George to get ready to drive Dr. Wilmot.--I'll send you the first stage. Awful journey, you call it, through the loveliest scenery in the Highlands! I don't know what causes the notion, but I have an impression that this will be a memorable day in your career, Chudleigh."
"Have you, old friend?" said Wilmot, with a shoulder-shrug. "One doesn't know how it may end, but, so far, it has been any thing but a pleasant one. Nor does a fifty-mile journey over hills inspire me with much pleasant anticipation. But, as you seem so determined about it being my duty, I'll go."
"Depend on it, I am giving you good advice, as some day you shall acknowledge to me."
And within half-an-hour Chudleigh Wilmot had started for Kilsyth, on a journey which was to influence the whole of his future life..
CHAPTER III.
Watching and Waiting.
The news which she had learned from Doctor Joyce, and had in her brief pencil-note communicated to her husband, was horribly annoying to Lady Muriel Kilsyth. To have her party broken up--and there was no doubt that, as soon as the actual condition of affairs was known, many would at once take to flight--was bad enough; but to have an infectious disorder in the house, and to be necessarily compelled to keep up a semblance of sympathy with the patient labouring under that disorder, even if she were not required to visit and tend her, was to Lady Muriel specially galling; more specially galling as she happened not to possess the smallest affection for the individual in question, indeed to regard her rather with dislike than otherwise. When Lady Muriel Inchgarvie married Kilsyth of Kilsyth,--the Inchgarvie estates being heavily involved, and her brother the Earl, who had recently succeeded to the title, strongly counselling the match,--she agreed to love, honour, and obey the doughty chieftain whom she espoused; but she by no means undertook any responsibilities with regard to the two children by his former marriage. The elder of these, Ronald, was just leaving Eton when his stepmother appeared upon the scene; and as he had since been at once gazetted to the Life-guards, and but rarely showed in his father's house, he had caused Lady Muriel very little anxiety. But it was a very different affair with Madeleine. She had the disadvantage of being perpetually en évidence; of being very pretty; of causing blundering new acquaintances to say, "Impossible, Lady Muriel, that this can be your daughter!" of riling her stepmother in every possible way--notably by her perfect high-breeding, her calm quiet ignoring of intended slights, her determinate persistence in keeping up the proper relations with her father, and her invariable politeness--nothing but politeness--to her stepmother. One is necessarily cautious of using strong terms in these days of persistent repression of all emotions; but it is scarcely too much to say that Lady Muriel hated her stepdaughter very cordially. They were too nearly of an age for the girl to look up to the matron, or for the matron to feel a maternal interest in the girl. They were too nearly of an age for the elder not to feel jealous of the younger--of her personal attractions, and of the influence which she undoubtedly exercised over her father. Not that Lady Muriel either laid herself out for attraction, or was so devotedly attached to her husband as to desire the monopoly of his affection. By nature she was hard, cold, self-contained, and very proud. Portionless as she had been, and desirable as it was that she should marry a rich man, she had refused several offers from men more coeval with her than the husband she at last accepted, simply because they were made by men who were wealthy, and nothing else. Either birth or talent would, in conjunction with wealth, have won her; but Mr. Burton, the great pale-ale brewer, and Sir Coke Only, the great railway carrier, proffered their suits in vain, and retired in the deepest confusion after Lady Muriel's very ladylike, but thoroughly unmistakable, rejection of their offers. She married Kilsyth because he was a man of ancient family, large income, warm heart, and good repute. At no period, either immediately before or after her marriage, had she professed herself to be what is called "in love" with the worthy Scottish gentleman. She respected, humoured, and ruled him. But not for one instant did she forget her duty, or give a chance for scandalmongers to babble of her name over their five-o'clock tea. No woman married to a man considerably her senior need be at any loss for what, as Byron tells us, used to be called a cicisbeo, and was in his time called a cortejo, if she be the least attractive. And Lady Muriel Kilsyth was considerably more than that. She had a perfectly-formed, classical little head, round which her dark hair was always lightly bound, culminating in a thick knot behind, large deep liquid brown eyes, an impertinent retroussé nose, a pretty mouth, an excellent complexion, and a ripe melting figure. You might have searched the drawing-rooms of London through and through without finding a woman better calculated to fascinate every body save the youngest boys, and there were many even of them who would gladly have boasted of a kind look or word from Lady Muriel. When her marriage was announced, they discussed it at the clubs, as they will discuss such things, the dear genial old prosers, the bibulous captains, the lip-smacking Bardolphs of St. James'-street; and they prophesied all kinds of unhappiness and woe to Kilsyth. But that topic of conversation had long since died out for want of fuel to feed it. Lady Muriel had visited London during the season; had gone every where; had been reported as perfectly adoring her two little children; and had no man's name invidiously coupled with hers. Peace reigned at Kilsyth, and the intimates of the house vied with each other in attention and courtesy to its new mistress; while