“My good fellow,” said Salis sternly, “you are trying to murder yourself. Sit still, or I’ll hold you down. If you don’t know what’s good for yourself, it’s fit some one should.”

“But I tell you – ”

“And I tell you,” cried Salis angrily, for Tom Candlish’s fierce obstinacy was teaching him that the clerical garb and years of mental repression will not quite crush out the natural man.

“It’s very good of you to come, North,” he said, crossing to his friend. “Getting up out of a sick bed, too, for the cause of this brute. I wish sometimes that education did not force us to be so extremely benevolent and philanthropic over mauvais sujets; but it does. Are you better?”

“Yes,” said North hastily; and his face being free from marks, he was able to confront his friend boldly. “I knew there was no doctor within reach, and I was afraid the case might be turning serious. Let’s see.”

He walked up to the bed, with Tom Candlish quailing before him, and watching his eyes as some timid animal might when expecting capture or a blow.

“I protest – I – ”

“Hold your tongue, sir,” cried Salis sternly. “Dr North is here for your good. Lie still.”

“I don’t know whether my way is right,” he added to himself, “but firmness appears to be best with the brute.”

North seemed to hesitate a few minutes – fighting between routine, the desire to do what was right by the man he believed he had nearly killed, and his intense dislike, even hatred, of the scoundrel for whom he told himself he had been jilted by a wretched, shameless girl.

Salis looked on curiously.

“Effect of the power of the eye,” he said to himself, as he saw North lay his hands upon the injured man’s shoulders, and, bending down, gaze into his eyes for a few moments. “By George! Horace North is a big fellow in his profession, and I shall begin to believe in psychology, mesmerism, animal magnetism, and the rest of it, before I’ve done.”

He leaned forward to gaze intently at what was going on.

“Quells him at once,” he said to himself. “Humph! he needn’t be quite so rough.”

This was consequent upon a quick, brusque examination of the patient, which evidently gave Tom Candlish a great deal of pain.

“Here, parson!” he yelled; “this man’s – ”

He did not finish, for North’s teeth grated together, and he tightened his grasp so firmly that Tom Candlish’s head sank back, his battered face elongated, and he lay perfectly still, feeling quite at the mercy of his enemy.

North ended his examination by literally thrusting Tom Candlish back upon his pillow in a way which made Salis stare.

“He will not hurt, save to do plenty more mischief, Salis. Look here; have you sent for Dr Benson?”

“Yes, sir,” said the butler wonderingly.

“Your master will be all right till he comes. Tell Dr Benson that I only came in upon the emergency. I have nothing to do with the case.”

“Certainly, sir.”

“And,” said North savagely, and evidently for Tom Candlish to hear, “if your master wishes to commit suicide, put that brandy decanter by his side. He smells of it now like poison. Come along, Salis.”

“You think him fit to be left?”

“Fit to be left!” cried North, whose uneasy conscience was now at rest. “Here: come away.”

“Why, Horace, old man, this is not like you,” cried Salis, as they were going down to the lodge gate.

“Like me!” cried North, turning upon him with a searching look, and reading in his eyes his thorough ignorance of the state of affairs. “No, it is not, old boy. I’m ill. My head aches fit to split, and the sight of that man, now my nerves are on the rack, exasperates me.”

“Well, never mind. It was very good of you to get up and come; but, all the same, I’m glad you did, for it has set my mind at rest as to danger. There’s no danger – you are sure?”

“Sure? Yes. He has the physique of a bull. Curse him!”

“Ha – ha – ha – ha – ha!” roared Salis, laughing in the most undignified manner, and then raising his eyes to encounter the fierce gaze of his friend.

“What are you laughing at?” cried North angrily.

“At Tom Candlish – the noble Sir Thomas! It’s comic, now that I know there is no danger. Why, Horace, old fellow, don’t you know how it happened?”

North paused as he stared wildly at Leo’s brother.

“Don’t I know how it happened?” he faltered.

“It’s over some love affair, and the scoundrel has been caught.”

“What?”

“Yes; that’s it,” cried Salis joyously. “I don’t know for certain, and this is confoundedly unclerical, but it’s glorious. The brute! Some father or brother or lover has caught him, and thrashed him within an inch of his life. My dear Horace, I don’t know when I’ve felt so pleased.”

The doctor’s face was a study of perplexity in its most condensed form. The injury to his head had tended to confuse him, so that he could not think clearly according to his wont, and he felt a longing to explain everything to, and confide in, his old friend; but he could not speak, for how could he tell him that his sister had been so base? It must come from another, or Salis must find it out for himself; he could not speak.

“I’ve talked to the fellow before,” continued the curate. “I’ve preached to him; I’ve preached at him; and all the time I’ve felt like a bee upon the back of a rhinoceros, hard at work blunting my sting. Stick, sir, stick is the only remedy for an ill like that of Squire Tom, and, by George! Horace, he has had a tremendous dose.”

“Yes,” said North, whose conscience felt more at ease now that he had satisfied himself as to the young man’s state.

“Did you see his eyes?” cried Salis, laughing again; “swollen up till they look like slits; and won’t they be a glorious colour, too – eh, Horace, old fellow! There, don’t bully me for saying it, but you know what used to trouble me. How I should like Leo to have her disenchantment completed. I should have liked her to see the miserable brute as he is – battered and flushed with brandy.”

North started violently.

“There, there, I ought not to have said it, but I’m speaking of my own sister, and of something of the past which you know all about. How can girls be such idiots?”

North did not speak, but walked swiftly on beside his friend, who, repenting of what he had said, and feeling that it had been in execrable taste, hastened to change the subject, so as to place the doctor at ease.

“Did you hear this morning’s news?” he said.

“News?” said North, turning sharply.

“No; of course you could not, being ill in bed, where you’d better go again. Burglary, my boy. We’re getting on.”

“Burglary?”

“Yes: sacrilegious burglary, sir. One of those King’s Hampton rascals – one of May’s lambs – broke into the vestry last night.”

It was on North’s lips to say furiously, “There, speak out, man! If you know all about this, say so at once;” but the words seemed to halt there, and he only gazed wonderingly as Salis talked on in his easy, good-tempered way.

“Moredock came up to tell me this morning.”

“Moredock?”

“Yes; we were to have had the vestry meeting, you know.”

“Of course: I said I was too ill to come,” said North hoarsely.

“So you are. Well, the old fellow went up to dust and put the place straight, and he found that some one had broken in by the window, and had evidently been interrupted, for my gown was torn down and thrown on the floor, and they had carried off my new surplice.”

“Carried off your surplice!” stammered North.

“Yes,” said the curate, looking at his friend wonderingly, and thinking how ill he seemed. “Nearly new surplice, sir; and I shall have to come round in forma pauperis for subscriptions to get another. You will have to fund up among the rest, if you don’t want to see your poor parson in rags, or sister Mary working her poor little fingers to the bone to keep the old one darned. Ah! here we are.”

The curate uttered a sigh of relief, for he had been chattering away with a purpose – to keep his friend’s attention from his state, for, as he held his arm, he could feel him reel from time to time.

“Thank Heaven!” muttered North, as he staggered in at the gates of the Manor. “Good-bye, Salis, good-bye.”

“Yes, I’ll say good-bye presently, old chap. It’s no use disguising the fact. You’re ill, and ought not to have come out. I shall see you to bed, and you must tell me what to do.”

“No, no; I can manage,” protested North.

But Salis would not go.

“My dear boy, it’s of no use. You know how obstinate I am. I should stop with you if it were small-pox, so just hold your tongue. Hah! Now Mrs Milt, the doctor’s got his turn after laughing at us poor mortals so long. Let’s get him to bed, and you must help me to keep him there.”

“I’m not a bit surprised,” began Mrs Milt, in a vinegary, snappish way; and then the tears started to her eyes, and she caught North’s hand in hers and kissed it. “Oh, my poor, dear master!” she sobbed.

It was all momentary. The spasm passed off, and in a busy, tender, matter-of-fact way, she helped the half-delirious man to bed, when, acting upon a hint or two he gave, the old housekeeper and Salis laid their heads together to prescribe.

Volume Two – Chapter Twenty.
A Parcel by Carrier

Dr Benson drove over daily from King’s Hampton to attend Sir Thomas Candlish, and, to do Dr Benson justice, he made a very good professional job of the injury to the young baronet, both from his own and the ordinary point of view.

Tom Candlish protested, but the doctor was inexorable.

“No, sir,” he said, “injuries like yours require time. Nature must be able to thoroughly mend the damage done. I could have helped her to patch you up – to cobble you, so to speak; but the tender spot would break out again. I must do my work thoroughly.”

“But your drives over here – your bill will be monstrous.”

“Large, but not monstrous, my dear sir,” said Dr Benson, smiling; “and what are a few pounds compared to your valuable life?”

Tom Candlish lay thinking that there was something in this, and that it was far better to pay even a hundred pounds than to have been carried to the Candlish mausoleum, and without paying out North for the injuries he had received.

“How’s North?” he said.

“Oh, very well, I believe. Dr North and I do not meet very often. A clever young man, though – a very clever young man.”

“Humph! Don’t believe in him,” said Tom Candlish. “But he has been very ill.”

“Little touch of sunstroke, or something of that kind, sir. I saw his patients for two days only; then he was about again.”

“Humph!” ejaculated Tom Candlish. “Doctor, I’m low to-day; I must have some champagne.”

“My dear sir! out of the question.”

“Brandy, then!”

“Worse and worse.”

“But I’m sinking. This cursed low feeling is horrible.”

“Well, well!” said the doctor smoothly, as, after a moment’s consideration, he felt that the wine would only throw his patient back for a few days, and give him a longer period for attendance; “perhaps a drop – say, half a glass – would not hurt you, but I would not exceed half a glass; champagne glass, mind. Good morning.”

Dr Benson took his departure, perfectly aware that the young baronet would be exceedingly ill the next morning; and so he was, for Tom Candlish had a medical sanction for taking a little champagne; and the butler produced the bottle – one of many dozens laid in by Squire Luke, who had purchased them through a friend as a special brand.

It was a special brand of paraffin quality, well doctored with Hambro’ spirit; and as, after the first glass, Tom Candlish argued that the rest would be wasted or drunk by the servants, an opened bottle of the effervescent wine being useless if not utilised at once, he, in spite of the protestations of the butler, finished the bottle, and threw himself back for another week.

At the Rectory, matters had settled down somewhat, the hours gliding by without any discovery being made; and, after the first excitement and dread, Leo began to feel that she would soon be able to resume her meetings with her lover.

North had ceased to call at the Rectory, and they had not yet come face to face. But this troubled Leo less and less. As the days had passed on, and the éclaircissement had halted, so had her strength of mind and feeling of defiance increased.

“He dare not face me after his brutal treatment of poor Tom,” she had said; “and he knows the contempt in which I hold him. He cannot be so pitiful as to tell Hartley, intimate as he and my brother are. I have nothing to fear.”

She feared, though, all the same, though she did not know from whence the stroke she anticipated would fall. Dally was extremely pert, but then she always had been. She could know nothing; and in a defiant spirit, Leo settled herself down in a fool’s paradise, eagerly waiting for the recovery of the squire.

The one policeman from King’s Hampton had been over and discoursed with the one policeman of Duke’s Hampton re the sacrilege at the church, and they had taken into their counsel the one policeman stationed at Chidley Beauwells, a village five miles away, but they had made nothing out of that. There was the attack, though, upon the squire, which seemed very promising, and the trio waited upon him as soon as he was pronounced well enough to be seen.

The injury must have had an acerbating effect upon Tom Candlish, for, to use the constables’ words, they came down out of the bedroom with fleas in their ears; and after having a horn of ale apiece, went back to the village.

Their way was by the churchyard, where Moredock was sunning himself by leaning over the wall, so that the heat could play well upon his back, and he entered into conversation with the three myrmidons of the law in a questioning spirit.

“Wouldn’t give you any information, would he?”

“No,” said he of King’s Hampton. “Told us to go to – you know.”

“No, I don’t,” said Moredock grimly, as if the allusion to this knowledge at his time of life was unsavoury. “But why wouldn’t he tell you? Don’t he want who it was caught?”

“Said it was nothing of the kind,” said he of Chidley Beauwells.

“Yes,” said the Duke’s Hampton man; “said it was an accident, old boy – a fall.”

“Hi! Yes. I s’pose it would be,” said Moredock drily. “Squire had a nasty accident before – a fall. Some people do have accidents of that sort.”

“Well,” said the Duke’s Hampton policeman, “we’ve done our duty, and that’s enough for us.”

“Ay,” said Moredock. “You’ve done your dooty, and that’s enough for you.”

They parted, and Moredock chuckled.

“Bats is nothing and moles is telescopes to ’em. Uniforms seems to make constables blind. Well, all the better for me. Hallo! where’s carrier going to-day? Doctor’s, p’raps, with some new stuff.”

The carrier was, however, not going to the doctor’s, but passed on.

“Don’t quite know what to make of him,” muttered Moredock. “That crack o’ the head don’t seem to have healed up, for he looks queer sometimes. I don’t like the look of things, somehow; but we shall see – we shall see. Why don’t Dally come down, too? I wanted to know how things is going there, and she ought to ha’ got that shirt made by now.

“Hi! hi! hi!” the old man laughed. “Make me two noo best shirts o’ fine linen as a man may be proud on. Ill wind as blows nobody any good.”

The old man went chuckling away, as he thought over the two new Sunday shirts he was to have made out of the surplice, which, after unpicking and cutting off edgings, he had washed and dried and handed as so much new material to Dally to make up, long immunity from detection having made him daring enough to trust the linen to the very place that, to an ordinary observer, would have seemed most dangerous.

But the shirts were not made yet, for Dally had declared it to be all bother, and had put the roll of linen in her drawer, inspired by a feeling that gran’fa couldn’t live much longer, and then the linen would do for her.

Oddly enough, as Moredock mused upon the whiteness and coolness of the coming undergarments, the carrier stopped at the Rectory gate, and delivered a parcel, carriage paid by North Midland Railway to King’s Hampton station, but sixpence to pay for the ten miles by cart.

“Dear me!” said Salis, turning over the package, which was evidently a box done up in very stout brown paper. “‘The Reverend Hartley Salis, Duke’s Hampton Rectory, Warwickshire. By N.M. Rail and Thompson, carrier. Carriage paid to King’s Hampton.’ Well, that’s plain enough, Mary.”

“Yes, dear; it’s evidently for you.”

“Yes, evidently for me; eh, Leo?”

“Yes,” said Leo, looking up from her book for a moment, and dropping her eyes again without displaying any further interest.

“It’s very curious,” said Salis, rather excitedly. “‘From Irish and Lawn, robe makers, Southampton Street.’ Why, surely – bless my soul, I never sent. I – ”

He busily cut the string, and opened the paper and the neatly-tied box within, to find, as, after reading the label, he had expected, that the contents consisted of a new surplice of the finest quality with a note pinned thereto, and written within, in a tremulous, disguised hand:

“From an admirer.”

The word “admirer” had been lightly scratched across, and “constant attendant” placed above.

Salis looked at the note, and then at his sister Mary, colouring with excitement as ingenuously as a girl.

“Why, Mary,” he said, “who could have sent this? Do you know?”

Mary shook her head, but her eyes brightened with pleasure, as she felt how gratified her brother would be.

“Did not you and Leo contrive this as a surprise?”

Mary shook her head again, and Leo looked up languidly.

“What is it?” she said. “A present? No,” she added, with a frown, as she saw what it was, and lowered her eyes to her book to read apparently with great interest.

“Then it must be one of North’s tricks,” cried Salis. “It’s very kind and thoughtful of him, but I cannot think of letting him give me such a present as this. Look, Mary, dear. It is his writing disguised, is it not?”

Mary’s hand trembled a little as she took the note and glanced at it, to detect the writer at once from a peculiarity which had not been concealed.

“Well,” cried Salis, “I am right?”

Mary shook her head again.

“No, Hartley, it is certainly not Mr North’s writing.”

“Then, in the name of all that’s wonderful, whose is it? The people would not subscribe for it. Besides, it says ‘from a constant attendant.’ Why, good heavens! it cannot be from – ”

Mary glanced at Leo, who was intent upon her reading, and then looked back at her brother, with a half-mischievous and amused smile, as she nodded her head.

“You think so, too,” he exclaimed, in a whisper. “Oh!”

There was a look of trouble and perplexity in his face that was intensely droll, for, though no name had been mentioned, both had hit upon the donor; and as the trouble deepened in the curate’s face, Mary stretched out her hand to him, and he took it, and sat down by her side.

“It’s impossible,” he whispered. “I could not think of taking it. How could she be so foolish?”

“It seems cruel to call it foolish,” said Mary gently. “The idea was prompted by a very kindly feeling.”

“Of course, of course; but, my dear Mary, it is putting me in a false position.”

“Not if you treat it as an anonymous gift.”

“How can I, when I feel certain that she sent it?”

“But even if you are, I think you might keep it, Hartley. See how common it is for ladies of a congregation to present the curate with slippers or braces.”

“Yes,” said Salis drily; “and all out of gratitude to their spiritual teacher. Bless ’em, they throw their gifts, and the weak man thinks they are bladders to enable him to float lightly along the social current of air, when, lo! and behold, he finds, poor weak, fluttering butterfly, that one of the fair naturalists has stuck a pin through him, right into the cork, and he is ‘set up’ for life.”

“Nonsense, you vain coxcomb!”

“No, my dear Mary, I am not a vain man; but I can generally tell which way the wind blows. I have a certain duty to perform in connection with my two sisters – a sort of paternal rôle to play, and consequently I am rather afraid of Mrs Berens.”

“Hartley, dear!”

“Yes, Mary. This surplice is going to be paid for by H. Salis, clerk in holy orders, ill as he can afford to do it, or it is going back to the donor.”

“But what can she do with it if your idea is correct?”

“Cut it up to make little garments for the poor children, if she likes. Bother the woman: I wish she would go.”