Works of Ellen Wood

by Ellen Wood

  The operation, however, was begun, he found. When he got back, Mark had plunged into it. Dr. Davenal stepped up to him, and stood overlooking him with his unerring eye; that eye which Mark had dreaded.

  Was it in consequence of that, that Mark Cray lost — what shall we call it? — his presence of mind? — his surgical skill? A suppressed sound, half indignation, half dismay, escaped the lips of Dr. Davenal, and he pushed Mark aside with an authoritative hand and took his place. What could have taken Mark? — what ailed him? Lady. Oswald was offering no opposition, for she lay perfectly still.

  So still, so voiceless, that in the midst of his work it struck strangely on the senses of Dr. Davenal. He paused a moment to regard her attentively, and then glanced at Mark, one single word only escaping him.

  “Chloroform?”

  “Yes,” said Mark. “ I judged it best.”

  It was all that passed. Whatever Dr. Davenal may have felt, he could express neither doubt nor remonstrance then. His whole attention had to be concentrated on the work he was performing. Mark stood by and watched, saying nothing.

  At length it was over; admirably performed, as all operations were performed, undertaken by Dr. Davenal. But Lady Oswald still lay without sense or motion; and they could not arouse her.

  “You must have given her a great deal,” observed Dr. Davenal, who was still occupied.

  Which Mark Cray did not attempt to deny. “She required it. The fall of that stupid woman excited her terribly. The first lot made no impression on her: she did not seem to inhale it.”

  “But — good heavens? you could not have waited long enough to see. Mark Cray, this is a mistake, and an awful one.”

  Mark made no reply. Mark was doing all in his power to undo his work and arouse Lady Oswald. But he could not. Dr. Davenal touched his shoulder, and spoke upon a different subject.

  “You told me you were sure of yourself.”

  Mark scarcely knew what he answered. Something to the effect that he always had been sure, until now: but his words were very indistinct.

  “What incapacity came over you? What was its cause?”

  It was impossible for Mark Cray to deny that incapacity had attacked him; that Lady Oswald under his hands would have been in the greatest danger. Its cause he could not account for: but that common expression, “losing all presence of mind,” would best describe it as it really was, and as it had appeared to Dr. Davenal The drops of sweat stood out on his brow now as large as peas.

  “The woman’s fall startled me,” he attempted to say. “At such a moment it takes but little to unnerve a man.”

  “Then, if so, he is not fit for a surgeon,” returned Dr. Davenal. “Mark Cray,” he continued, gravely and firmly, but not unkindly, “you must never in my presence attempt a critical operation again. Recollect that.”

  Meanwhile their whole attention was being given to Lady Oswald; their best efforts exerted to arouse her from the effects of the chloroform. All in vain, all useless; it had done its work too effectually.

  By degrees the horror of the conviction that she could not be aroused — never more would be aroused — came pressing upon them deeper and deeper. Mark Cray wiped his hot face, and felt that he would give all he was worth to recall that one act of his — the surreptitiously conveying the chloroform to the house, which he had himself so successfully accomplished, and regarded as a cause of self-congratulation. Why had he not attended to the experienced opinion of Dr. Davenal — that Lady Oswald was one of those upon whom chloroform was not unlikely to be fatal? That it would be fatal in this case, Mark felt as certain note as if the breath had actually passed for ever from her body. A horrible fear came over him, and he once more lost all calmness, all selfpossession.

  “Dr. Davenal, for the love of God, do not betray me! Do not let it go forth to the world as my wilful act — one you warned me against. It was a dreadful mistake. I shall carry it about with me in my heart for ever; but do not betray me to the world!”

  He had seized the doctor’s hands, and was pressing them nervously in his. His troubled face gazed imploringly upwards; his wailing tone of repentance struck sadly on the ear. Dr. Davenal did not immediately speak, and Mark Cray resumed.

  “For Caroline’s sake,” he entreated. “If this mistake becomes known in all its unhappy details, my professional doom is sealed. Never again, so long as I live, as you and I are together, will I attempt to act on my opinion in opposition to yours. Be merciful to us, Dr. Davenal, and, for her and my sake, conceal it from the condemning world!”

  And Dr. Davenal yielded. Ever merciful, ever striving to act in accordance with those great precepts of love and mercy which One came down eighteen hundred years ago to teach, he yielded to the prayer of the unhappy and agitated man before him. His own partner — Caroline’s husband; no, he could not, would not, bring upon him the obloquy of the world.

  “I will keep the secret, Mark Cray. Be easy. You have my promise.”

  The unhappy tidings were made known to the household — that their mistress could not yet be aroused from the effect of the chloroform which had been administered with a view of saving her pain; and they came flocking in. She was not dead; but she was lying still and motionless: and the means for recalling life went on. Mark Cray continued his efforts when all hope was gone, trying every means, probable and improbable, in his madness. Had a battery been at hand he would have essayed galvanism.

  Alas! they might as well have sought to arouse a stone statue. Never more would there be any arousing for poor Lady Oswald in this world. Death was claiming her: uncompromising, not-to-be denied death!

  Parkins, considerably recovered from her own attack, but in a shaky and tearful state, had come into the room with the rest Parkins seemed inclined to rebel at the state of things; to question everybody, to cast blame somewhere.

  “Why should chloroform have been given to her?” she asked of Mr. Cray.

  “It was given with a view to deaden the pain,” was Mark’s short answer.

  “But, sir, the operation was all but begun, if not begun, when I — when I — fainted: and there had been no question then of giving her chloroform.”

  “No, and it was your fainting that did three parts of the mischief,” savagely returned Mr. Cray, who felt it the greatest relief to be able to lay the blame upon somebody. “It put her into a most undesirable state of agitation. I should think you must have heard her shriek, in spite of your fainting-fit.”

  The words, the angry tone, completely did for Parkins, and she subsided into tears again. A few minutes, and Dr. Davenal turned from the ill-fated lady to her servants standing there.

  “It is all over. She is gone.”

  And the doctor looked at his watch, and found that only one poor hour had elapsed since he had entered the house to perform that operation which had altogether terminated so fatally.

  CHAPTER XVI.

  NEAL’S DISMAY.

  DR. DAVENAL and Mr. Cray went forth together. Outside the hall-door stood Julius Wild. It now wanted twenty minutes to seven. The Infirmary pupil had arrived a quarter of an hour before, and had waited patiently ever since to be let in. He had rung the bell in vain. In the confusion and distress of the house, it had, perhaps, not been heard, certainly had not been attended to. His rings had been but gentle ones: Julius Wild knew better than to make a noise at a house when illness was inside it: and he waited patiently enough, wondering whether the servants were asleep, whether Lady Oswald was worse, and believing the doctors had not yet come.

  When they came forth, he was excessively surprised, marvelling greatly at his non-admittance.

  “I have been ringing this quarter of an hour,” he said, by way of explanation and apology. “I can’t think what the servants can have been about.”

  “What have you been about?” thundered Mark Cray, giving way to anger, although he had come straight from the presence of the dead.

  Mr. Wild was astonished. “I say, sir, I have been waiting here. I have been
here this quarter of an hour, and could not get let in.”

  “And, pray, what kept you? Why were you not here to time?”

  “I was here to time, sir,” was the deprecating answer; and the young man marvelled much what had so put out his good-tempered medical master. You told me to be here a little before half-past six, sir, and I got here five minutes before it.”

  Then began that dispute which was never satisfactorily settled; each, to this very day, believing himself to be in the right. Mr. Cray held to it that he had told him half-past five; Julius Wild earnestly protested that he had said half-past six. The wrangling continued for some minutes, or rather the difference of opinion, for of course the pupil did not presume to wrangle with his superior. A few sharp words from Mark, peremptorily ordering him to hold his tongue, concluded it. The young man walked close by the two doctors, just a little behind them — for they had been walking down from Lady Oswald’s all along, had not stayed for one minute at the door. He had wondered at first whether the operation had taken place, and why they should leave the house just about the time fixed for it: now that he heard of this misapprehension with regard to the hour, he supposed it was over, and that Mr. Cray’s vexation arose from the fact of his not having arrived for it. But he was a young man of curiosity, fond of sociability in a general way, and of asking questions, so he thought he would ask one now, and make sure.

  “Is the operation over, sir?”

  “Yes,” curtly answered Mark.

  “Was it successful?”

  “When did you ever know Dr. Davenal unsuccessful?” retorted Mr. Cray. “That was successful enough.”

  It never occurred to Julius Wild that the stress upon the word “that” implied, or could imply, that though the operation had been successful, something else was not Perhaps it was half a subterfuge in Mark Cray to have said it The young man asked no more questions. Finding himself so snubbed, he desisted, and walked behind in silence. Neither of them told the unhappy truth to him. Dr. Davenal may have been too pained, too shocked to speak; Mark Cray’s conscience too suggestive. Nay, Dr. Davenal may not have seen his way clear to speak at all. If he was to conceal the culpability of Mark Cray, the less he opened his mouth upon the point, even by a word, the better.

  Suddenly Mark turned round. “You are not wanted, Mr. Wild. There’s nothing more to-night.”

  The young man took the hint at once, wished them goodevening, and walked off to the Infirmary, there to leave certain articles that he had been carrying. He observed that Dr. Davenal, usually so courteous, never answered him, never gave him the goodevening in reply to his.

  The two surgeons walked on in silence. The streets were nearly deserted; and the sound of praise and prayer came upon their ears from the lighted places of worship as they passed them. The evening was a warm one, and the doors of the churches and chapels stood open. They never spoke a word, one to the other. Mark Cray felt as he had probably never felt in his life — ashamed, repentant, grieved, humble. He was guilty of the blood of a fellow-creature. He called it a “mistake.” A mistake in one sense it undoubtedly was, but a wicked and a wilful one. Dr. Davenal felt it to be both: felt that the giving of the chloroform stealthily, in direct opposition to his expressed opinion, deserved a worse name; and, though he had promised not to betray Mark, he could not just yet subdue his own feelings, and speak to him in a friendly tone. Thus in silence they reached the doctor’s gate.

  “Good-night,” said he, turning in at it.

  “Good night,” replied Mark, continuing his way. But — and he felt it — there had been no invitation to him to enter, no pleasant look, no shake of the hand.

  Neal was at the door, airing himself and watching the scanty passers-by in the dusky street, the rest of the household being at church. Dr. Davenal went into his study, and lifted his hat from his brow as if a heavy weight were there. He had no light, save what came in from the street gas-lamp.

  He leaned against the window in thought. Two hours before, Lady Oswald had been, so to say, as full of life as he was, and now — dead. Killed. There was no mincing the matter to himself; she had been killed. Killed by Mark Cray.

  Had he done right in undertaking to screen Mark Cray? — to keep his culpability a secret? — to suffer the world to assume his innocence? The reader may deem it a grave question: Dr. Davenal Was asking it of himself. Had Mark’s been purely an error in judgment; had he administered the chloroform, believing it to be the right and proper thing to do, leaving the issue with God, it had been different. But he had given it in direct opposition to an opinion of more value than his own; in, as was much to be feared, a spirit of obstinate defiance. It is true he had not intended to kill; he had probably been over-confident of the result How Dr. Davenal condemned him he alone could tell; but — was it his, the doctor’s place, to hold him forth to the condemnation of the world? No; he, the merciful man, thought it could not be. One strong point on the side of this mercy was — that the proclaiming the facts could be productive of no good result; they could not recall the mistaken act; they could not bring the unfortunate lady back to life. It might be said that it should be made known as a warning to others not to trust Mark Cray; but the very occurrence itself with its tragical end, would, if the doctor knew anything of human nature, be its own warning for Mark Cray’s whole lifetime. He did not think much of the surgical failure; at least he was not dwelling on it. Probably the worst calamity had in a measure eclipsed the other in his mind. Young surgeons had turned nervous before now, as Dr. Davenal knew; and the fall of the maid Parkins might certainly have startled him. It was not that that was troubling him; he had arrested Mark’s shaking hands, and replaced them with his own sure ones, and carried the matter through successfully; it was the other.

  He thought it over and over, and could not bring himself to see that he had done wrong in promising to hide the facts. If he went that hour and stood in the market-place and shouted them forth to all hearers, it could not bring back the forfeited life; it could not remedy the past in the remotest degree. He thought of his dead brother, Caroline’s father; he remembered the words he had sent out to him to soothe his dying bed—” The child shall be to me as a daughter.” He could not, on the very threshold of her wedded life, bring obloquy on the husband of her choice, and blight his good name, his fair prospects. And so he resolved to keep the secret — to guard the fatal mistake from the knowledge of the world. Only their own two selves were privy to it; therefore Mark was perfectly safe — save for him. The administering the chloroform must be looked upon as an error in judgment, of his own as well as of Mark’s: and yet scarcely an error, for perhaps nine surgeons out of ten would so have administered it to a patient under similar circumstances, and have made no exception in Lady Oswald. He, Dr. Davenal, must suffer this to be assumed, saying himself as little as was possible upon the matter to any one: in a case where the termination had been so unfortunate his reticence would be excused.

  He leaned his head upon his hand in the dark twilight, and pondered over the circumstances: he could not keep his mind from dwelling upon them almost morbidly. A strange fatality seemed to have attended the affair altogether. There had been the obstinate persistence of Lady Oswald to see her landlord, in spite of common-sense and of Mr. Oswald Cray’s representation that it could not possibly serve her; there had been the sudden falling lame of the carriage horse, for which the coachman had been unable to account; and then there had been the accident to the train. Parkins had told him a confused tale — confused through her own grief, poor woman — of their having gone by mistake, she and her mistress, to the wrong side of the station at Hildon to take the return train, and had thereby lost a train. They went, naturally enough perhaps to inexperienced travellers, to the side of the platform on which they had descended on going; and it was not until a train came up to the other side, took in the passengers waiting on that side of the platform, and went on to Hallingham, that they discovered their mistake. But for that, they would have been at Halli
ngham safe and sound when the accident happened to the late train. Then there was the fact of Mark Cray’s having been in the train, of his having been the first to see Lady Oswald. When brought afterwards to the home terminus, she had said, “Mr. Cray will go home with me and later she had insisted on his taking the operation. He himself had been called out to Thorndyke, had been kept there while the long hours of the best part of the day had flitted away: had he not been called out, why the operation would, beyond all question, have been performed in the morning, probably by himself, for he should have seen her early and detected its need. There was the absence of the pupil, Julius Wild, through what appeared an unaccountable mistake: had that pupil been present, to him would have fallen the task of getting Parkins from the room, and the chloroform could not have been administered. A curious chapter of accidents — or what are called such — and Dr. Davenal lost himself in the chain of thought. “O merciful Father, forgive him! forgive him this night’s work!” he murmured. “And mayst Thou have taken that poor woman to her rest!”

  A great light and Neal’s smooth voice broke upon Dr. Davenal.

  “Shall I get you anything, sir? Tea, or” —

  “I don’t want anything, I don’t want the gas lighted,” interrupted Dr. Davenal, starting from his chair. “Wait until you are called.”

  Neal, after a moment’s stare, shot back again. It was not so much the sharp words, more imperative than any commonly used by his master, but the wailing tone of pain in which they were spoken, that struck Neal: nay, it almost seemed as if his entrance had brought a sort of terror to the doctor.

  It was not terror. Neal was mistaken. But Dr. Davenal had been so completely buried in thoughts, not altogether of this world, that the abrupt interruption, with its common-place excuse, had seemed to him singularly inopportune, causing him to wave away abruptly the man and his words.