"Hem!" said Charles. "I can"t say it sounds comfortable."
"It is just as I feared!" said Amy. "Great excitability of brain and nerve, Dr. Mayerne said. All the danger of a brain fever again! Poor Laura! What is to be done?"
Charles was silent.
"It is for want of some one to talk to him," said Amabel. "I know how he broods over his sad recollections, and Redclyffe must make it so much worse. If mamma and Laura were but at home to go to him, it might save him, and it would be fearful for him to have another illness, reduced as he is. How I wish he was here!"
"He cannot come, I suppose," said Charles, "or he would be in Ireland."
"Yes. How well Guy knew when he said it would be worse for him than for me! How I wish I could do something now to make up for running away from him in Italy. If I was but at Redclyffe!"
"Do you really wish it?" said Charles, surprised.
"Yes, if I could do him any good."
"Would you go there?"
"If I had but papa or mamma to go with me."
"Do you think I should do as well?"
"Charlie!"
"If you think there would be any use in it, and choose to take the trouble of lugging me about the country, I don"t see why you should not."
"Oh! Charlie, how very, kind! How thankful poor Laura will be to you! I do believe it will save him!" cried Amabel, eagerly.
"But, Amy,"--he paused--"shall you like to see Redclyffe?"
"Oh! that is no matter," said she, quickly. "I had rather see after Philip than anything. I told you how he was made my charge, you know.
And Laura! Only will it not be too tiring for you?"
"I can"t see how it should hurt me. But I forget, what is to be done about your daughter?"
"I don"t know what harm it could do her," said Amy, considering. "Mrs.
Gresham brought a baby of only three months old from Scotland the other day, and she is six. It surely cannot hurt her, but we will ask Dr.
Mayerne."
"Mamma will never forgive us if we don"t take the doctor into our councils."
"Arnaud can manage for us. We would sleep in London, and go on by an early train, and we can take our--I mean my--carriage, for the journey after the railroad. It would not be too much for you. How soon could we go?"
"The sooner the better," said Charles. "If we are to do him any good, it must be speedily, or it will be a case of shutting the stable-door. Why not to-morrow?"
The project was thoroughly discussed that evening, but still with the feeling as if it could not be real, and when they parted at night they said,--"We will see how the scheme looks in the morning."
Charles was still wondering whether it was a dream, when the first thing he heard in the court below his window was--
"Here, William, here"s a note from my lady for you to take to Dr.
Mayerne."
"They be none of them ill?" answered William"s voice.
"O no; my lady has been up this hour, and Mr. Charles has rung his bell.
Stop, William, my lady said you were to call at Harris"s and bring home a "Bradshaw"."
Reality, indeed, thought Charles, marvelling at his sister, and his elastic spirits throwing him into the project with a sort of enjoyment, partaking of the pleasure of being of use, the spirit of enterprise, and the "fun" of starting independently on an expedition unknown to all the family.
He met Amabel with a smile that showed both were determined. He undertook to announce the plan to his mother, and she said she would write to tell Mr. Markham that as far as could be reckoned on two such frail people, they would be at Redclyffe the next evening, and he must use his own discretion about giving Mr. Morville the note which she enclosed.
Dr. Mayerne came in time for breakfast, and the letter from Markham was at once given to him.
"A baddish state of things, eh, doctor!" said Charles. "Well, what do you think this lady proposes? To set off forthwith, both of us, to take charge of him. What do you think of that, Dr. Mayerne?"
"I should say it was the only chance for him," said the doctor, looking only at the latter. "Spirits and health reacting on each other, I see it plain enough. Over-worked in parliament, doing nothing in moderation, going down to that gloomy old place, dreaming away by himself, going just the right way to work himself into another attack on the brain, and then he is done for. I don"t know that you could do a wiser thing than go to him, for he is no more fit to tell what is good for him than a child." So spoke the doctor, thinking only of the patient till looking up at the pair he was dismissing to such a charge, the helpless, crippled Charles, unable to cross the room without crutches, and Amabel, her delicate face and fragile figure in her widow"s mourning, looking like a thing to be pitied and nursed with the tenderest care, with that young child, too, he broke off and said--"But you don"t mean you are in earnest?"
"Never more so in our lives," said Charles; on which Dr. Mayerne looked so wonderingly and inquiringly at Amabel, that she answered,--
"Yes that we are, if you think it safe for Charles and baby."
"Is there no one else to go? What"s become of his sister?"
"That would never do," said Charles, "that is not the question;" and he detailed their plan.
"Well, I don"t see why it should not succeed," said the doctor, "or how you can any of you damage yourselves."
"And baby?" said Amy.
"What should happen to her, do you think?" said the doctor with his kind, rea.s.suring roughness. "Unless you leave her behind in the carriage, I don"t see what harm she could come to, and even then, if you direct her properly, she will come safe to hand." Amabel smiled, and saying she would fetch her to be inspected, ran up-stairs with the light nimble step of former days.
"There goes one of the smallest editions of the wonders of the world!"
said Charles, covering a sigh with a smile. "You don"t think it will do her any harm?"
"Not if she wishes it. I have long thought a change, a break, would be the best thing for her--poor child!--I should have sent her to the sea-side if you had been more movable, and if I had not seen every fuss about her made it worse."
"That"s what I call being a reasonable and valuable doctor," said Charles. "If you had routed the poor little thing out to the sea, she would have only pined the more. But suppose the captain turns out too bad for her management, for old Markham seems in a proper taking?"
"Hem! No, I don"t expect it is come to that."
"Be that as it may, I have a head, if nothing else, and some one is wanted. I"ll write to you according as we find Philip."
The doctor was wanted for another private interview, in which to a.s.sure Amabel that there was no danger for Charles, and then, after promising to come to Redclyffe if there was occasion, and engaging to write and tell Mrs. Edmonstone they had his consent, he departed to meet them by and by at the station, and put Charles into the carriage.
A very busy morning followed; Amabel arranged household affairs as befitted the vice-queen; took care that Charles"s comforts were provided for; wrote many a note; herself took down Guy"s picture, and laid it in her box, before Anne commenced her packing; and lastly, walked down to the village to take leave of Alice Lamsden.
Just as the last hues of sunset were fading, on the following evening, Lady Morville and Charles Edmonstone were pa.s.sing from the moor into the wooded valley of Redclyffe. Since leaving Moorworth not a word had pa.s.sed. Charles sat earnestly watching his sister; though there was too much c.r.a.pe in the way for him to see her face, and she was perfectly still, so that all he could judge by was the close, rigid clasping together of the hands, resting on the sleeping infant"s white mantle.
Each spot recalled to him some description of Guy"s, the church-tower, the school with the two large new windows, the park wall, the rising ground within. What was she feeling? He did not dare to address her, till, at the lodge-gate, he exclaimed--"There"s Markham;" and, at the same time, was conscious of a feeling between hope and fear, that this might after all be a fool"s errand, and a wonder how they and the master of the house would meet if it turned out that they had taken fright without cause.