The White Virgin

“As we forgive them that trespass against us,” rose to Dinah’s brain. “Yes, Doctor, you must go,” she said softly; and he nodded his head.

“Good girl,” he said, and he left her. – “Ah, Janet, my child, why were you not like that? My training, I suppose. – Now, sir, I am ready.”

Robson started from his seat in the porch, and led the way toward the mine, relating all he knew of the case to the Doctor as they went.

“He was alone in the mine one morning, sir, and had a nasty fall. He injured his shoulder a good deal, and refused to have any medical advice till it had all gone bad. He said the doctors were fools, and that a bandage and cold water were all that was necessary.”

“And found out that some one was a bigger fool than the doctors, eh?” said the old man drily.

“Yes, sir, I suppose so,” replied the clerk, smiling. “This way, please.”

He led the Doctor down to the little house apportioned to the foreman; and as they approached it, Jessop and Wrigley came out, the former, who looked haggard and careworn, seeming disposed to hurry away, but he mastered his shrinking and stood firm.

“How do?” said the Doctor, with a short nod. “Janet quite well?”

“Yes, Doctor,” cried Jessop eagerly, “and – ”

“Stand aside, please,” said the old man testily. “I want to talk to this gentleman. Are you Mr Wrigley?”

“I am, and I am very grateful to you for coming, sir. I am very anxious about our man.”

“Where is he?”

“This way, please.”

The Doctor followed into a bedroom where the man lay, hollow of cheek and half delirious, while one of the miners’ wives was playing the part of nurse.

“Mr Jessop Reed, I can dispense with your company, sir. I want to be alone. You can go too, my good woman, and you, Mr What’s your name? Robson. No, you stay, Mr Wrigley. I may want to ask some questions.”

Jessop went out scowling.

“A brute!” muttered the Doctor. “Knows his brother is, perhaps, on his deathbed, and has never sent to ask how he is.”

The next minute he was examining the patient, who lay perfectly still, while a hideous wound in the shoulder, which was evidently of long standing, was bared.

“Curious kind of hurt!” said the Doctor. “Here’s something within which irritates it.”

“Piece of rock splinter, perhaps,” suggested Wrigley.

“Very likely; but he will never get well with that in his flesh. – Don’t groan, man. It’s to do you good. Humph, look here. I thought it was a singular injury.”

He held out a piece of green metal with some fine-looking letters upon it, and Wrigley examined them.

“Eley!” he said. “Why, it is a piece of a brass cartridge.”

“That’s right. The man has been shot. Hallo! That makes him wince. Why, he is hurt here, too, in this leg. No doubt about this. The bite of some animal. Dog, I suppose. Are you sure that our friend here is not a poacher?”

“I never heard of anything of the kind,” replied Wrigley.

“Humph!” ejaculated the Doctor, “just the sort of case I should expect to meet with where men went out after game, and then lay in hiding after a fight with the keepers.”

“I can do no more now,” he said, after a busy pause. “I’ll come and see him to-morrow, and dress the places again. They will not kill him. I daresay the wound in the shoulder will heal now; the bite, too, for a time – may break out again, though.”

Just then Wrigley’s hand went to his pocket, and the Doctor frowned.

“Never mind that, sir,” he said. “This was done out of charity. If all I hear is right, we are fellow-sufferers.”

“You lost, then, by the mine,” said Wrigley eagerly.

“Yes, sir, heavily, when some confounded scoundrel put about that report, and made me join in the panic. But the fellow who bought up the shares has been nicely trapped – and – why, hang it all, are you the Mr Wrigley?”

“At your service, sir,” said the solicitor coldly, but looking rather white.

“Then, Mr Wrigley, I have the pleasure of telling you that you are a confounded scoundrel, and I’m glad you’ve lost by your scheme. Stop! one word! what about Jessop Reed?”

“He is outside, sir; you can speak to him.”

“Not I. The pair of you hatched the swindle, I’ll be bound. Take care of this man, and he is to have no spirits or meat yet, but I’ll come in and see him again.”

Wrigley said no more, and the Doctor marched out with his head up, gave Jessop a short nod, and strode back to continue his watching by Clive Reed’s couch; but, on entering the room, he gave a start, for his patient’s eyes turned to him directly.

Dinah suppressed a cry, and the Doctor made her a sign to be silent, while he quickly sat down and took his patient’s hand, which closed softly upon his fingers. Then, as the eyes still gazed in his in a dreamy way, there was a faint smile of recognition. Soon after the lids dropped softly, like those of a weary infant; and as the Doctor bent lower, there was a sigh, and the regular rise and fall of his breath.

Dinah stood back with her hands clasped, her pupils widely dilated, and a beseeching look of agony in her eyes, as the Doctor slowly rose. Then, seeing the dread and horror painted in her face, he smiled, took her hand, and led her, trembling with hope and apprehension, out of the room.

“Dying?” she cried, in a low, piteous, wailing tone.

“Yes: we’ve killed the fever, and he is sleeping as peacefully as a child.”

“Ah!”

One low, piteous sigh, and Dinah would have fallen to the floor had not the Doctor caught her in his arms, for she fainted dead away.

The Major, who was, in his dread, always upon the qui vive, joined them on the instant, and helped to bear his child to a couch.

“Overcome?” he whispered.

“With joy. Yes: our poor boy will live.”

Chapter Thirty Eight.

The Ruptured Vein

“He’s my father-in-law, Wrigley, but he’s an old beast,” said Jessop, in a low snarling tone, as the Doctor’s steps died away in the distance.

“I daresay he is,” replied Wrigley; “but this is no time for pouring your domestic troubles on my head. What did you mean by telling me that this man, Sturgess, fell down a shaft?”

“That’s what he told me – a brute! I’ve no sympathy with him whatever, but I don’t, want it to be said that we neglected him, in case he dies. We’ve got troubles enough.”

“Rather. It’s about as near utter ruin as a man can get. Stockbroker? You’re lucky if you don’t turn stone-broker.”

“Mind what you’re talking about. You’ll have that fellow Robson hear you.”

“Doesn’t seem to matter to me who hears me now. The game’s up.”

“No, no, wait till that fellow comes and makes his examination.”

“Oh yes. I’ll wait. Here by twelve, won’t he? But I’m not going to pin my faith to his coming. To me as good an idea as ever man put upon the market has gone dead.”

“Yes, curse you, and ruined me,” growled Jessop. “You always were so cursed clever.”

“Come, I like that; ruined you, eh? Ruin the ruined. Why, for years past you’ve never been worth a rap, and have had to come to me to keep you going.”

“And pretty dearly I’ve had to pay for it.”

“Yes; a man who wants his bills discounted, and who is known to be stone broke, does have to pay pretty smartly for the risk that is run. But never mind, Jessop, we must try something else. I say, though, that father-in-law of yours is a tartar. You don’t expect to get anything out of him, do you?”

“He must leave his daughter his money.”

“No, he mustn’t. There are plenty of hospitals and charities about. He’ll never let you have a sou.”

“Can’t you find some other cursedly nasty thing to tell me, Wrig,” snarled Jessop. “It’s infernally cowardly of you, that’s what it is. Thank goodness, here’s the engineer.”

“Then now we shall get out of our difficulties or plunge deeper in. Why couldn’t you know something about mining engineering, and so have saved this expense?”

“Mr Wrigley?” said a quiet, solid-looking man, riding up to the office door.

“My name is Wrigley, sir. Are you Mr Benson?”

“Yes; and I came as soon as I could, after I heard from the Woden Mine Company’s secretary. What is the question, gentlemen. Deeper sinking? Troubled with water?”

“No,” said Jessop eagerly. “The lode we have been working has suddenly come to an end in the solid stone.”

“I see. A blind lead,” said the newcomer, dismounting.

“And we want advice as to what is best to do so as to hit again upon the ore,” said Wrigley. “I hear that you stand at the top of the tree in such matters.”

“Very kind of people to say so, sir,” replied the mining engineer. “I do my best. But you used to have a first-class man here – Mr Clive Reed.”

“Yes; but he is dangerously ill, or I should have called him in,” said Wrigley; and Jessop’s countenance cleared. “Well, sir, shall we go down the mine?”

“Better let me go alone, sir,” said the engineer. “I cannot tell you what you want to know in a minute. Perhaps it will take me a week.”

“Take your time, only get to work, and let’s have the full truth, as soon as you can,” said Wrigley, and the engineer nodded, had himself put into communication with the underground foreman, and passed the whole of the following week in the mine. At the end of that time he announced that he was ready with his report, and an adjournment was made to the little office, where Wrigley threw himself into a chair, and Jessop lit a cigar which kept going out, and had to be re-lit again and again, as the expert began to read his carefully written report of his work from day to day.

“My dear sir,” said Wrigley at last, impatiently, “we do not want to hear what time you went into the mine each day, or when you came out, nor yet about how you tested the surroundings of the great lode in different places. Let’s have your final decision, and the position.”

“Very good, gentlemen. I’ll give you both together. The lode ends dead against the barren rock.”

“Which we had already discovered,” said Wrigley sarcastically.

“Through a geological fault,” continued the engineer; “and I have tried hard to make out whether the vein of silver lead, where it was snapped off in some convulsion, or gradual sinking, went down or up.”

“Down or up,” said Jessop, who was listening eagerly, trying with nervous fingers to re-light his cigar from time to time.

“If it went downward, by constant search and sinking – ”

“Money?” interrupted Wrigley.

“I mean shafts, sir,” said the engineer, smiling; “but you may include money; you might perhaps hit upon the lode again; but I am inclined to think, from the conformation of the strata, that the vein was snapped in two and thrust upward.”

“What!” cried Jessop, “then it must be close to the surface?”

“I should say, sir, it was on the surface, and all cleared away hundreds upon hundreds of years ago.”

“But you would sink shafts to try if it had gone down?” said Wrigley, eyeing the engineer keenly.

“No, sir; if it were my case I would be content with the money I had got out of the mine.”

“General burst up, Jessop, my lad,” said Wrigley coolly. “The ‘White Virgin’s’ reputation is smirched, and she is not immaculate after all. Thank you, Mr Benson, I am quite satisfied with your judgment. There, you must have your cheque. There will not be many more for any one.”

Just about the same time, after a week’s trembling in the balance, Clive Reed had taken a turn which filled all at the cottage with hope. His senses returned upon that day a week earlier; but after some hours’ calm sleep, he woke in so enfeebled a state that it required all the efforts of nurse and doctor to keep him from sinking calmly away into the great sleep of all.

Now he was undoubtedly amending, and getting better hour after hour, though still so weak that he was unconscious of who it was who tended him night and day. Nothing seemed to trouble him. Nature had prescribed utter rest so that she might have time to rebuild the waste, and the Doctor’s chief efforts were directed towards keeping him free from the slightest trouble which might ripple the placid lake of his existence.

“There now,” he said, “let him sleep all he can. That is the best.”

He walked over to the mine, arriving there soon after the engineer had gone, and avoiding Jessop, went straight into the room occupied by Sturgess, who lay waiting for him eagerly.

“Better, arn’t I, Doctor?”

“Yes; getting stronger fast. The festering wound looks healthy now.”

“What festering wound?” said the man, with a stare.

“The one in your shoulder, which you said was caused by a fall.”

Sturgess scowled.

“Lucky for you I was fetched to you in time, and then dressed the wound in your leg. Your flesh was in a bad way, my man. You should never neglect the bite of a dog.”

“Fear he should go mad?” said Sturgess grimly. “No fear o’ that one going mad now.”

“Shot him, I suppose.”

“Yes,” said Sturgess, smiling. “I shot him, Doctor. When may I get about again?”

“Oh, not for a week or two yet – perhaps three. You mustn’t hurry.”

“Can’t you get me up in a week, sir?” said the man anxiously. “I have got a good deal to do.”

“Not in the mine. That’s at an end.”

“Yes, I heard that. But no, it arn’t that. It’s business I want to settle about some one I know.”

“Ah, well, we shall see,” said the Doctor. “Be patient.”

He walked back to the cottage, and not seeing either the Major or his child, hung up his hat, and went to Clive’s chamber, where he stopped short at the door, startled by the scene within. For Dinah was in the act of advancing to the bed just as Clive lay half dozing.

The sharp crack of a floor board roused him into wakefulness, and he opened his eyes wonderingly, so that they fell upon Dinah’s sweet, sad face.

The result was startling to the Doctor, and filled Dinah with agonising despair. For as the light of recognition came into the suffering man’s countenance, his features contracted, his brow wrinkled and twitched, and he turned his eyes away with a look of disgust and horror, while Dinah uttered a low moan, covered her face with her hands, and fled from the room, her whole attitude and every movement suggesting utter despair.

Chapter Thirty Nine.

After a Lapse

“Why, my dear child, it is one of the commonest of things. I’ve known plenty of cases of this kind, and I daresay your father has.”

Dinah looked at the Doctor wistfully, with her face growing old and careworn; but she said nothing, only turned to her father, as he took and held her hand.

“Come, come, this will not do,” continued the Doctor. “I don’t want to have you upon my hands as a patient. Now, look here; I promise you that all will come right, and it is not the physic-monger speaking now, but your father’s friend.”

The Major darted a grateful look at the speaker, while Dinah did not stir, but sat hardly hearing him, alone with her despair.

“They do not know all,” she said to herself; “they do not know all.”

“You see, my dear,” continued the Doctor, “he is rapidly mending, and he knows us all, and speaks sensibly; but he is not quite compos mentis yet his brain had a nasty shock, from which it is recovering, but it must have time. You feel it bitterly, of course, but it is a natural, though only temporary, outcome of this ailment. Over and over again we doctors find that the one the invalid loves best – wife, mother, betrothed – is the one against whom he takes an unaccountable dislike, and in endless cases this is the one who has devoted herself to constant nursing. Ah, they re an ungrateful lot, patients, when they are a bit off their heads. I had one to whom I was administering nothing but beef tea, and water just flavoured with syrup of aurantia – orange and sugar, you know. Well, that ruffian swore that I was slowly poisoning him.”

“But Reed has quite recovered his senses,” said the Major uneasily; “it is six weeks to-day since he turned like this.”

“He has not quite recovered his senses, or he would be upon his knees, asking pardon of an angel, sir. No, my dear, I’m not flattering you, for if ever woman displayed devotion and love for sinful man, you have done so for my boy Clive. Come, promise me that you will try and hold up, for your father’s sake. Yes, and Clive’s. He is rapidly growing stronger, but he wants your help to console him for his losses. That is what we want to get off his brain. Once he can bear that philosophically all will be well.”

The Doctor’s long speeches were cut short by a visitor in the shape of Wrigley, who was shown in by Martha, Dinah at the same moment escaping to her room, where, on approaching the window, she became aware of the fact that Jessop had accompanied the visitor. He was waiting at the bottom of the garden down by the river, and she shrank away in horror and dread as she trembled lest Clive should see him and it might bring on a fresh attack.

For a few moments she thought of going to Clive’s room and telling him. But the dread of meeting his cruel searching eyes, and experiencing another of those shrinking looks of horror and disgust, kept her away, and she sank wearily into a chair, shivering, and with the feeling of utter despair growing upon her more and more.

Meanwhile a scene was taking place in the little dining-room below, where the Major had made a sign toward a chair.

“Thank you,” said Wrigley. “I will not detain you long.”

“What is it, sir? Sturgess worse?” said the Doctor.

“Oh, no! The fellow is, thanks to you, Doctor, growing stronger and more impudent every day. The fact is, gentlemen, I have come over to see Mr Clive Reed. His brother is waiting down by the river. He would not come in, as they are not on good terms.”

The Major frowned.

“As I am Mr Clive Reed’s doctor, sir, I have a right to ask you what you want with him.”

“Simple matter of business, sir. I want him to come over and inspect the mine.”

“Not fit, sir. Too weak,” said the Doctor sternly. “Bless my soul! my dear boy, are you mad?”

“I hope not, Doctor,” said Clive, as he entered the room, looking very white, but quite able to dispense with the stick he held in his hand.

“Glad to see you about again, Mr Reed,” said Wrigley at once, and he held out his hand; but it was not taken. “Mr Reed, I have come on behalf of the shareholders in the ‘White Virgin’ mine.”

“Including yourself, sir, and Mr Jessop Reed?” said Clive coldly.

“Of course,” said Wrigley, with an assumption of frankness. “We stand to be heavy losers over the mine if the lost lode is not discovered. But perhaps you don’t know that the rich vein has ended suddenly?”

“I know everything in connection with the mine, sir,” said Clive, as the Doctor watched him anxiously; but to his intense gratification saw nothing to cause him uneasiness.

“That’s well, sir. Then I will be quite plain with you, and ask you to let bygones be bygones, for I am sure that you, as an English gentleman, and one of our principal shareholders, wish for nothing but what is fair and right by all concerned.”

He ceased and waited for Clive to speak, but the engineer remained silent, and Wrigley went on —

“I should tell you, sir, that our foreman, Sturgess, has made the most careful investigations, both before his illness and since. He is hardly fit to be about.”

“Not fit,” said the Doctor.

“Exactly, sir; but he has insisted upon going down the mine during the past four days, and testing in different directions. Then, too, we have had the advice of an eminent mining engineer, Mr Benson, and unfortunately both give a decidedly adverse report. Well, sir, this is bad, but for my part I have great faith in your knowledge.”

“Which you showed, sir, by scheming with my brother to get me ousted from the post!”

“An error in judgment, Mr Reed, due to an eager desire to make money. I made the mistake of choosing the wrong brother. I apologise, and you know that I have suffered for my blunder. But let us repair all the past for the sake of everybody concerned. Mr Clive Reed, in perfect faith that you will restore the ‘White Virgin’ to her former prosperity, I, as a very large holder of shares, ask you to resume your position as manager and engineer. Tell me that you will do this, and I will at once go back to town, call an extraordinary meeting, and get your reappointment endorsed.”

A slight flush came into Clive’s pale cheeks as he sat listening to Wrigley’s words, and the latter took hope therefrom.

“I see that you feel that there is hope for the mine, sir,” he said eagerly; “and that you will sink the past and join us in working heart and soul for every one’s benefit.”

The Major looked curiously at Clive, whom the excitement of the interview seemed to be rousing from his despondent state, but drawing himself up, the latter said quietly —

“I am sorry, of course, sir, for the innocent shareholders in the mine, but the interim dividends that they have received prevent them from being heavy losers. As to the speculators, they must thank fate that their losses are not greater.”

“Yes, yes, of course, Mr Reed, but you will soon set all that right. Take a month at sea, sir, at the company’s expense, and come back strong as a lion, ready to go to work again, and make the ‘White Virgin’ richer than ever.”

“No, sir,” said Clive coldly. “I lose more heavily than any one, and I am prepared to stand by my losses.”

“Yes, yes, but you will soon recoup – there will be no losses. I know that you must naturally feel a jealousy of my friend, Jessop Reed.”

Clive’s face darkened.

“But he shall not be in your way, my dear sir. You can take it for granted that he will in future have no part in the management. You shall stand at the head, and your judgments shall be unquestioned.”

“I thank you, sir, for this great display of confidence,” said Clive coldly; “but I have ceased to take any interest in the mine – I may say in anything whatever in life. No, sir, I will have no dealings whatever with you and your partner in the cowardly scheme by which I was overthrown. I can only thank you for arranging that this collapse should not occur during my management. All right, Doctor; I have done. I am not going to be excited, and this interview is at an end.”

“Yes, this one,” said Wrigley, rising. “You are still weak, Mr Reed, and I will not bother you more to-day. I shall stay at the mine, and be happy to run over on receiving a message, for that you will come round to my wishes I am convinced. Good morning, gentlemen, and I should advise you both to invest heavily in the mine shares, for this second panic has sent them down almost to zero.”

He smiled pleasantly and went out to join Jessop, who was waiting impatiently, but with his eyes fixed upon Dinah’s open window all the time.

“A smooth, deceitful scoundrel!” said Clive contemptuously, and he held out a hand to the Doctor, who laid a finger upon his pulse. “Quite calm, Doctor,” he continued. “Yes, I’m about well now. I only want rest and peace. As soon as you will let me, I will go right away. On the Continent, I think.”

“Yes; do you a great deal of good, my dear boy,” said the Major. “We must have a change too. Poor Dinah is very pale.”

Clive was silent for a few moments, and then said coldly —

“Yes, Miss Gurdon looks very white. I am most grateful to you, Major Gurdon, for the care and attention I have received in this house.”

“Then prove it, sir,” said the Major sternly.

“I will,” said Clive, with not a muscle moving. “I will do so by releasing your daughter from an engagement which has become irksome and painful to her.”

“What!”

“From any ties which held her to a kind of bankrupt – to a man broken in health, pocket, and his belief in human nature.”

“Mr Clive Reed,” began the Major haughtily. “No: Clive, my dear boy, you are sick and look at things from a jaundiced point of view. Don’t talk nonsense. You will think differently in a week.”

“Never,” said Clive firmly. “All that, sir, is at an end.”

“And pray why?” cried the Major. “When that attachment sprang up we believed you to be a poor man. Do you suppose Dinah’s love for you came from the idea that you were well-to-do?”

“We will not argue that, sir. Your daughter wishes the engagement to be broken off.”

“Indeed! I’ll soon prove that to be false,” cried the Major, springing up.

“No, sir,” cried the Doctor; “there has been enough for one day.”

But he was too late, for the Major had flung open the door, called “Dinah,” loudly, and her foot was already upon the stairs.