The Mystery of Mrs. Brandreth/Chapter 8

When Sir Beverley Drake undertakes a case he puts his whole soul into it, and no sacrifice of time or trouble is too much. I loved the great man when he quietly announced that he would live at Ralston Old Manor, coming in the day of the transfusion, and remaining till what he called the “end of the treatment, first phrase.”

This meant that he would be on the spot for a month. By that time he could be practically certain whether or no the serum had gripped the disease, and would at last conquer it. If success were the verdict, Sir Beverley would instruct another how to to continue the hypodermics and other treatment, and observe results.

“Selfishly, I should have liked to put the patient into a nursing home at Exeter,” he said, “where I could stop at home and visit him once a day. But I didn't feel that would be giving the man his best chance. He's in love with his wife, and in love with his house. I wouldn't separate him from either,”

This was splendid of Sir Beverley, and splendid for Murray, except for one possibility which I foresaw. What if Rosemary or Murray himself should suggest Paul Jennings as the doctor's understudy? I was afraid that this might happen, both because Jennings lived so near the Manor, and because of the friendship which Rosemary had oddly struck up with the French wife.

I dared not prejudice Sir Beverley against Murray's distant cousin, for I'd heard nothing to Paul's disadvantage, rather the contrary. He was said to be a smart doctor, up-to-date in his methods, and sure to get on. Still, I thought of the changed portraits, and tried to put the microbe of an idea in Sir Beverley's head. I told him that, if it hadn't been for Ralston Murray, Jennings would, without much doubt, have inherited the Manor, with a large sum of money.

The specialist's quick brain caught what was in mine as if I'd tossed it to him, like a ball.

“I suppose if Murray died now, Jennings could hope for nothing,” he said, “except perhaps a small legacy. Murray will have made a will in his wife's favor?”

“Yes,” I replied, “or rather he made a will when he was engaged to her, and has added a codicil since. But it's unusual in some ways, and might be disputed.”

Sir Beverley smiled.

“Well, don't worry,” he reassured me, “I have my own candidate to take over the job when I leave the Manor. I wouldn't trust a stranger, no matter how good a doctor he might be. So that's that.”

It was! I felt satisfied, and also more than satisfied with Rosemary. I went to see her the day before the transfusion experiment, and found her radiant, in a strange, spiritual way. It seemed to me more like exaltation than any earthly sort of happiness, and her words proved that my feelings about it were right.

“Whether Ralston lives or dies, I shall always be so thankful that I could do this thing for him! I don't think it's a big thing, though he does, and it was hard to persuade him. But to do it gives me the most divine joy, which I can't describe. If I'd been born for that and nothing else, it would be enough.”

“How you love him!” the words broke from me.

“I do love him,” she answered in a low voice, as if she spoke more to herself than me. “Whatever may happen, I have loved him and always will.”

“Aren't you frightened?” I asked.

“Frightened?” she echoed. “Oh, no!”

And quite a new sort of respect for her grew up within me, respect for her physical courage. She was such a tall, lily-in-silver-moonlight creature, and so sensitive, that one could not have been disgusted with her, as one can with some women, for cowardice, but she was brave in her love. When she said that she was not frightened, I knew she wasn't trying to make herself think so. She had no fear at all. She was eager for the moment when she could make the gift.

Jim and I were allowed to be in the house when the experiment was tried, not with the hope of seeing Murray or Rosemary afterward, but in order to know the result without waiting.

We sat in the library, and were presently joined by Paul Jennings and Gaby. They had grown so fond of “the hero and heroine of this romance” as Gaby put it, that they hadn't been able to keep away.

Jennings explained to us in detail the whole process of transfusion, and why it was more effective in a case like Murray's than the saline injections given by some modern men. I felt rather faint as I listened, seeing as if in a picture what those two upstairs were going through. But I knew that they were in the hands of a master, and that the assistant and nurses he had brought would be the most efficient of their kind.

“Would you do for me what your friend is doing for her husband?” Paul Jennings suddenly flung the question at his wife, and she answered him, not in words, but with a smile. I couldn't read what that smile meant, and I wondered if he could.

Jim would not have needed to ask me a thing like that!

After what seemed a long time of suspense, Sir Beverley came to tell us the news, looking like a strong-faced, middle-aged Pierrot in his surgeon's make-up.

“All's well,” he said. “They've both stood it grandly, and now they're asleep. I thought you'd like to hear it from me, myself.”

Then he looked from us to the Jennings, whom he had never seen before. I introduced them, and for the first time I became aware that Gaby Lorraine could, when she wished intensely, charm a man. She radiated some subtle attraction of sex, deliberately radiated it, and without one spoken word. She hadn't tried that stunt on my Jim, and if she had on Ralston Murray, I hadn't been there to see. There was something she wanted to get out of Sir Beverley!