“Well, I am devoting myself for the most part to the study of nervous diseases,” said the doctor. “There seems to be more opening there than in any other branch of my profession, and unless a man goes in for a speciality, he has no chance.”
“Come, Aunt Sophia,” said Scarlett, merrily; “here’s your opportunity. You are always complaining of your nerves.”
“Of course I am,” said the old lady sharply; “and no wonder.”
“Well, then, why not engage Doctor Scales as your private physician, before he is snatched up?”
“All, before I’m snatched up, Miss Raleigh. Don’t you have anything to do with me, madam. Follow your nephew’s lead, and take to gardening—There is medicine in the scent of the newly turned earth, in the air you breathe, and in the exercise, that will do you more good than any drugs I can prescribe.”
“There you are, aunt; pay up.”
“Pay up? Bless the boy! what do you mean?” said Aunt Sophia.
“A guinea. Physician’s fee.”
“Stuff and nonsense!” said Aunt Sophia.—“But I don’t want to be rude to you, Doctor Scales, and I think it’s worth the guinea far more than many a fee I’ve paid for what has done me no good.”
“I’ve got a case in hand,” said the doctor, going on with his dinner, but finding time to talk. “I’ve a poor creature suffering from nervous shock. Fine-looking, gentlemanly fellow as you’d wish to see, but completely off his balance.”
“Bless the man! don’t talk about mad people,” said Aunt Sophia.
“No, ma’am, I will not. He’s as sane as you are,” said the doctor; “but his nerve is gone, he dare not trust himself outside the house; he cannot, do the slightest calculation—write a letter—give a decisive answer. He would not take the shortest journey, or see any one on business. In fact, though he could do all these things as well as any of us, he doesn’t, and, paradoxical as it may sound, can’t.”
“But why not?” said Scarlett.
“Why not? Because his nerve has gone, he dare not sleep without some one in the next room. He could not bear to be in the dark. He cannot trust himself to do a single thing for fear he should do it wrong, or go anywhere lest some terrible accident should befall him.”
“What a dreadful man!” cried Aunt Sophia.
“Not at all, my dear madam; he’s a splendid fellow.”
“It must be terrible for his poor wife, Doctor Scales.”
“No, ma’am, it is not, because he has no wife; but it is very trying to his sweet sister.”
“I say, hark at that,” said Scarlett, merrily—“ ‘his sweet sister.’ Ahem, Jack! In confidence, eh?”
“What do you mean?” cried the doctor, as the ladies smiled.
“I say—you know—his sweet sister. Is that the immortal she?”
“What? My choice? Ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha-ha?” laughed the doctor, with enjoyable mirth. “No, no; I’m cut out for a bachelor. No wedding for me. Bah! what’s a poor doctor to do with a wife! No, sir; no, sir. I’m going to preserve myself free of domestic cares for the benefit of all who may seek my aid.”
“Well, for my part,” said Aunt Sophia, “I think it must be a very terrible case.”
“Terrible, my dear madam.”
“But you will be able to cure him?”
“I hope so; but indeed that is all I can say. Such cases as this puzzle the greatest men.”
“I suppose,” said Arthur Prayle, in a smooth bland voice, “that you administer tonic medicines—quinine and iron and the like?”
“O yes,” said the doctor grimly. “That’s exactly what we do, and it doesn’t cure the patient in the least.”
“But you give him cold bathing and exercise, doctor?”
“O yes, Mr. Prayle; cold bathing and exercise, plenty of them; but they don’t do any good.”
“Hah! that is singular,” said Prayle thoughtfully. “Would the failure be from want of perseverance, do you think?”
“Perhaps so. One doesn’t know how much to persevere, you see.”
“These matters are very strange—very well worthy of consideration and study, Doctor Scales.”
“Very well worthy of consideration indeed, Mr. Prayle,” said the doctor; and then to himself: “This fellow gives me a nervous affection in the toes.”
“I trust my remarks do not worry you, Lady Scarlett?” said Prayle, in his bland way.
“O no, not at all,” replied that lady. “Pray do not think we cannot appreciate a little serious talk.”
Prayle smiled as he looked at the speaker—a quiet sad smile, full of thankfulness; but it seemed to trouble Lady Scarlett, who hastened to join the conversation on the other side, replying only in monosyllables afterwards to Prayle’s remarks.
The dinner passed off very pleasantly, and at last the ladies rose and left the table, leaving the gentlemen to their wine, or rather to the modern substitute for the old custom—their coffee, after which they smoked their cigarettes in the veranda, and the conversation once more took a medical turn.
“I can’t help thinking about that patient of yours, Jack,” said Sir James. “Poor fellow! What a shocking affair!”
“Yes, it must be a terrible life,” said Prayle. “Life, Arthur! it must be a sort of death,” exclaimed Scarlett excitedly. “Poor fellow! What a state!”
“Well, sympathy’s all very well,” said the doctor, smiling in rather an amused way; “but I don’t see why you need get excited about it.”
“Oh, but it is horrible.”
“Dreadful!” echoed Prayle.
“Then I must have been an idiot to introduce it here, where all is so calm and peaceful,” said the doctor. “Fancy what a shock it would give us all if we were suddenly to hear an omnibus go blundering by. James Scarlett, you are a lucky man. You have everything a fellow could desire in this world: money, a delightful home, the best of health—”
“The best of wives,” said Prayle softly. “Thank you for that, Arthur,” said Scarlett, turning and smiling upon the speaker.
“Humph! Perhaps I was going to say that myself,” said the doctor sourly. “Hah! you’re a lucky man.”
“Well, I don’t grumble,” said Scarlett, laughing. “You fellows come down here just when everything’s at its best; but there is such a season
