Page:Once a Week Volume 8.djvu/27

. 27, 1863.] as he had once searched for that lost prescription, which at the time appeared so much to disturb his peace.

the well-lighted drawing-room at Deerham Court was its mistress, Lady Verner. Seated with her on the same sofa was her son, Lionel. Decima, at a little distance, was standing, talking to Lord Garle. Lucy Tempest sat at the table, cutting the leaves of a new book; and Sibylla was bending over the fire in a shivering attitude, as if she could not get enough of its heat. Lord Garle had been dining with them.

The door opened, and Jan entered.

“I have brought you a visitor, Sibylla,” said he, in his unceremonious fashion, without any sort of greeting to anybody. “Come in, doctor.”

It caused quite a confusion, the entrance of Dr. West. All were surprised. Lionel rose, Lucy rose; Lord Garle and Decima came forward, and Sibylla sprung towards him with a cry. Lady Verner was the only one who retained entire calmness.

“Papa! it cannot be you! When did you come?”

Dr. West kissed her, and turned to Lady Verner with some courtly words. Dr. West was an adept at such. Not the courtly words that spring genuinely from a kindly and refined nature; but those that are put on to hide a false one. All people, true-hearted ones, too, cannot distinguish between them: the false and the real. Next, the doctor grasped the hand of Lionel.

“My son-in-law!” he exclaimed, in a very demonstrative manner. “The last time you and I had the pleasure of meeting, Mr. Verner, we little anticipated that such a relationship would ensue. I rejoice to welcome you in it, my dear sir.”

“True,” said Lionel, with a quiet smile. “Coming events do not always cast their shadows before.”

With Decima, with Lord Garle, with Lucy Tempest, the doctor severally shook hands: he had a phrase of suavity for all.

“I should not have known you,” he said to the latter.

“No!” returned Lucy. “Why?”

“You have grown, Miss Tempest. Grown much.”

“Then I must have been very short before,” said Lucy. “I am not tall now.”

“You have grown into remarkable beauty,” added the doctor.

Whether Lucy had grown into beauty or not, she did not like being told of it. And she did not like Dr. West. She had not been in love with him ever, as you may recollect; but she seemed to like him now, as he stood before her, less and less. Drawing away from him when she could do so civilly, she went up and talked to Jan.

A little while, and they had become more settled, dispersing into groups. The doctor, his daughter, and Lionel were sitting on a couch apart, conversing in an under tone; the rest disposed themselves as they would. Dr. West had accepted a cup of coffee. He kept it in his hand, sipping it now and then, and slowly eat a biscuit.

“Mr. Jan tells me Sibylla is not very strong,” he observed, addressing both of them, but more particularly Lionel.

“Not very,” replied Lionel. “The cold weather of this winter has tried her; has given her a cough. She will be better, I hope, when it comes in warm.”

“How do you feel, my dear?” inquired the doctor, apparently looking at his coffee-cup instead of Sibylla. “Weak here?”—touching his chest.

“Not more weak than I had used to be,” she answered, in a cross tone, as if the confession that she did feel weak was not pleasant to her. “There’s nothing the matter with me, papa; only Lionel makes a fuss.”

“Nay, Sibylla,” interposed Lionel, good-humouredly, “I leave that to you and Jan.”

“You would like to make papa believe you don’t make a fuss!” she cried, in a most resentful tone. “When you know, not two days ago, you wanted to prevent my going to the party at Mrs. Bitterworth’s!”

“I plead guilty to that,” said Lionel. “It was a most inclement night, a cold, raw fog that penetrated everywhere, carriages and all else, and I wished you not to venture out in it. The doing so increased your cough.”

“Mr. Verner was right,” said Dr. West. “Night fogs are pernicious to a degree, where the chest and lungs are delicate. You should not stir out of the house, Sibylla, after sunset. Now don’t interrupt, my dear. Let the carriage be ever so closely shut, it makes no difference. There is the change of atmosphere from the warm room to the cold carriage; there are the draughts of air in passing to it. You must not do it, Sibylla.”

“Do you mean to say, papa, that I am to live like a hermit?—never to go out?” she returned, her bosom heaving with vexation. “It is not much visiting that I have had, goodness knows, since quitting Verner’s Pride: if I am to give it all up, you may as well put me out of the world. As good be dead!”

“Sibylla,” said the doctor, more impressively than he often spoke, “I know your constitution, and I know pretty well what you can and what you can not bear. Don’t attempt to stir out after sunset again. Should you get stronger it will be a different matter. At present it must not be. Will you remember this, Mr. Verner?”

“If my wife will allow me to remember it,” he said, bending to Sibylla with a kindly tone. “My will was good to keep her in, all this winter: but she would not be kept.”

“What has Jan been telling you about me, papa? It is a shame of him! I am not ill.”

“Mr. Jan has told me very little indeed of your ailments,” replied Dr. West. “He says you are not strong: he says you are fretful, irritable. My dear, this arises from your state of health.”

“I have thought so, too,” said Lionel, speaking impulsively. Many and many a time, latterly, when she had nearly tired out his heart and his patience, had he been willing to find an excuse for