The Doctor's Wife
THE FIRST WHISPER OF THE STORM.
There was no to take Mrs. Gilbert to Graybridge after the service at Hurstonleigh; but there had been some Graybridge people at church, and she them in the talking to some of the model villagers, in their of Mr. Colborne's eloquence.
Amongst these Graybridge people was Miss Sophronia Burdock, the maltster's daughter, very in a pink bonnet, so as almost to her freckles, and by Mr. Pawlkatt, the surgeon's son, and his sister, a sharp-nosed, high-cheek-boned damsel, who looked at the Doctor's Wife. Was not Mr. George Gilbert a man in Graybridge? and was it likely that the family of his should have any for the of his pale-faced wife?
But Miss Sophronia was in the to of fire on the of the nursery-governess George Gilbert had to marry. Sophronia was engaged, with her father's full consent, to the Pawlkatt, who was to his life for the full amount of the damsel's dower, which was to be up for her use and maintenance, &c., and who looked of so and a that the may have the as a very speculation. Sophronia was engaged, and the little and that Graybridge to the position of an lady. "The only way to make love now," said Mr. Nash to Goldsmith, "is to take no manner of notice of the lady." And Graybridge the art of very much in this fashion, that a well-bred not possibly be too in her of the man she had from all other men to be her partner for life. Acting on this principle, Miss Burdock, although in her manner to Julia Pawlkatt, and in her of the Doctor's Wife, her husband with a glare, only by a when the man to make any remark. To a lover to a of coma, and him in that to for an entire evening, was high art in Graybridge.
Everybody in the little Midlandshire town that Miss Burdock and Mr. Pawlkatt were engaged; and people that Augustus Pawlkatt had done a very thing for himself by to a lady who was to have four thousand up for her use and maintenance.
The of being and having a fortune, to Sophronia to but the "future." Was Isabel alone, and going to walk back? "Oh, then, in that case you must go with us!" Miss Burdock, with a view to the of the Augustus in coma.
What Mrs. Gilbert say, that she would be to go home with them? She was of him; she was looking to see his above the crowd. Of it would tower above that crowd, or any crowd; but he was like the famous Spanish in the "Critic," as she not see him he was not to be seen. She with Miss Burdock and her out of the churchyard, the meadow-path that across country Graybridge. They walked in a straggling, manner, for Sophronia all offers of her husband's arm; and he was to himself with the cold of her parasol, and a church-service of velvet, with a great many the pages.
The that Sabbath walk was not very for or wisdom. Isabel only spoke when she was spoken to, and then like a newly from a dream. Miss Julia Pawlkatt, who was an person, and herself upon not being frivolous, upon the names and of the hedge-blossoms the path, and a on the science of medicine as to female study, which would have for the ground-work of a in a Sunday paper.
Miss Burdock, who acquirements, and to be a thing of the Dora Spenlow stamp, her sister-in-law not to be "dreadful," and asked Isabel's opinion upon "dears" of that in Hurstonleigh church; and the future, who so spoke that it hard he should always himself when he did speak, a remarks, which were with black and looks by the of his heart.
"I say, Sophronia, weren't you to see Mr. Lansdell in the gallery?" the man remarked, his in a of a of may on the top of a white-tulle so sweet and innocent-looking. "You know, dear, he isn't much of a church-goer, and people do say that he's an atheist; yet there he was as large as life this afternoon, and I him looking very ill. I've my father say that all those Lansdells are consumptive."
Miss Burdock and at the with her pale-buff eyebrows, as if he had mentioned an French novel, or started some other subject. Poor Isabel's colour and came. Consumptive! Ah, what more likely, what more proper, if it came to that? These of people were to die early. Fancy the Giaour about in his year, and that he read small print without spectacles! Imagine the Corsair on the parish; or Byron, or Keats, or Shelley old, and dim, and grey! Ah, how much to be and Shelley, in an Italian lake, than Samuel Rogers, to demand, in bewilderment, "And who are you, ma'am?" of an and visitor! Of Roland Lansdell would die of consumption; he would little by little, like that Lionel in "Rosalind and Helen."
Isabel the occasion by asking, Mr. Augustus Pawlkatt if many people died of consumption. She wanted to know what her own were. She wanted so much to die, now that she was good. The Augustus was by this opening for a professional discourse, and he and his sister scientific, and neglected Sophronia, while they gave Isabel a good of useful disease, phthisis, &c. &c.; Miss Burdock, taking offence, into a of by Graybridge as an engaged, lady who to the of her position.
At last they came out of a great corn-field into the very in which George Gilbert's house was situated; and Isabel's friends left her at the gate. She had done something to her in Graybridge by her at Hurstonleigh church, which was as to the as her visits to Lord Thurston's had been. She had been of after Mr. Lansdell, people said. No George Gilbert had her goings-on, and had a means of her wings. It was not likely that Graybridge would her with any such as repentance, or a wish to be a woman than she had been. Graybridge her as an and creature, goings-on had been stopped by authority.
She into the parlour, and the tea-things on the little table, and Mr. Gilbert on the sofa, which was too for him by a of feet, and was out by a chair, on which his rested. Isabel had him give way to any such self-indulgence before; but as she over him, enough, if not tenderly, he told her that his and he was tired, very tired; he had been in the all the afternoon,—the people about there were very bad,—and he had been at work in the since in. He put his hand in Isabel's, and pressed hers affectionately. A very little attention from his wife him and him happy.
"Why, George," Mrs. Gilbert, "your hand is as as a coal!"
Yes, he was very warm, he told her; the weather was and oppressive; at least, he had it so that afternoon. Perhaps he had been too much, walking too fast; he had himself somehow or other.
"If you'll out the tea. Izzie, I'll take a cup, and then go to bed," he said; "I'm up."
He took not one cup only, but four cups of tea, the mild his at a draught; and then he up to the room overhead, walking heavily, as if he were very tired.
"I'm sure you're ill, George," Isabel said, as he left the parlour; "do take something—some of that medicine you give me sometimes."
"No, my dear, there's nothing the with me. What should there be with me, who had a day's in my life? I must have an assistant, Izzie; my work's too hard—that's what is the matter."
Mrs. Gilbert sat in the for a little while after her husband had left her, of that last look which Roland Lansdell had her in the church.
Heaven how long she might have sat of him, if Mrs. Jeffson had not come in with those two mould-candles, which were to make of yellow haze, not light, in the doctor's parlour. After the had been Isabel took a book from the top of the little by the fireplace. It was a religious book. Was she not trying to be good now, and was not with the of Shelley's on a Sunday? It was a very religious book, being in a of Tillotson's sermons, with more hard logic, and firstly, secondly, and thirdly, than ordinary nature support. Isabel sat with the open her, at the pale, old-fashioned type, and going a little way every now and then when she her away from the Reverend Tillotson. She sat thus till after the clock had ten. She was all alone in the part of the house at that hour, for the Jeffsons had gone up-stairs to at half-past eight. She sat alone, a childish, untaught, creature, at Tillotson, and of Roland Lansdell; yet trying to be good all the time in her own way. She sat thus, until she was by a single at the door. She started from her seat at the sound; but she enough, with the in her hand, to answer the summons.
There was nothing in a late at the doctor's door,—some one from the wanted medicine, no doubt; the people in the were always wanting medicine. Mrs. Gilbert opened the door, and looked out into the darkness. A man was there, a well-clad, handsome-looking man, with shoulders, black eyes, and a black that all the part of his face. He did not wait to be to enter, but walked across the like a man who had a right to come into that house, and almost pushed Isabel on one as he did so. At she only at him with a blank look of wonder, but all at once her as white as the plaster on the her.
"You!" she gasped, in a whisper; "you here!"
"Yes, me! You needn't as if you saw a ghost. There's nothing so very about me, is there? You're a lady, I don't think, to there and staring. Where's your husband?"
"Up-stairs. Oh, why, why did you come here?" the Doctor's Wife, piteously, her hands like a in some of and trouble; "how you be so as to come here; how you be so as to come?"
"How I be so—fiddlesticks!" the stranger, with contempt. "I came here I had else to go, my lassie. You needn't whimper; for I shan't trouble you very long—this is not the of place I should to hang-out in: if you can give me a in this house for to-night, well and good; if not, you can give me a sovereign, and I'll one elsewhere. While I am here, my name's Captain Morgan, and I'm in the merchant service,—just home from the Mauritius."
