CHAPTER XXX.
SIR BERNARD'S DECISION.
For fully a week I saw nothing of Ambler.
Sir Bernard was unwell, and remained down at Hove; therefore I wascompelled to attend to his practice. There were several serious cases,the patients being persons of note; thus I was kept very busy.
My friend's silence was puzzling. I wrote to him, but received noresponse. A wire to his office in the City elicited the fact that Mr.Jevons was out of town. Probably he was still pursuing the inquiry hehad so actively taken up. Nevertheless, I was dissatisfied that heshould leave me so entirely in the dark as to his intentions anddiscoveries.
Ethelwynn came to town for the day, and I spent several hours shoppingwith her. She was strangely nervous, and all the old spontaneousgaiety seemed to have left her. She had read in the papers of thecurious connection between the death of the man Lane and that of herunfortunate sister; therefore our conversation was mainly upon theriver mystery. Sometimes she seemed ill at ease with me, as thoughfearing some discovery. Perhaps, however, it was merely my fancy.
I loved her. She was all the world to me; and yet in her eyes I seemedto read some hidden secret which she was endeavouring, with all thepower at her command, to conceal. In such circumstances there wasbound to arise between us a certain reserve that we had not beforeknown. Her conversation was carried on in a mechanical manner, asthough distracted by her inner thoughts; and when, after having teatogether in Bond Street, we drove to the station, and I saw her off onher return to Neneford, my mind was full of darkest apprehensions.
Yes. That interview convinced me more than ever that she was, in somemanner, cognisant of the truth. The secret existence of old Mr.Courtenay, the man whom I myself had pronounced dead, was the crowningpoint of the strange affair; and yet I felt by some inward intuitionthat this fact was not unknown to her.
All the remarkable events of that moonlit night when I had followedhusband and wife along the river-bank came back to me, and I sawvividly the old man's face, haggard and drawn, just as it had been inlife. Surely there could be no stranger current of events than thosewhich formed the Seven Secrets. They were beyond explanation--all ofthem. I knew nothing. I had certainly seen results; but I knew nottheir cause.
Nitrate of amyl was not a drug which a costermonger would select witha view to committing suicide. Indeed, I daresay few of my readers,unless they are doctors or chemists, have ever before heard of it.Therefore my own conclusion, fully endorsed by the erratic Ambler,was that the poor fellow had been secretly poisoned.
Nearly a fortnight passed, and I heard nothing of Ambler. He was still"out of town." Day by day passed, but nothing of note transpired. SirBernard was still suffering from a slight touch of sciatica at home,and on visiting him one Sunday I found him confined to his bed,grumbling and peevish. He was eccentric in his miserly habits and hishatred of society, beyond doubt; and the absurdities which his enemiesattributed to him were not altogether unfounded. But he had, at allevents, the rare quality of entertaining for his profession a respectnearly akin to enthusiasm. Indeed, according to his views, the facultypossessed almost infallible qualities. In confidence he had more thanonce admitted to me that certain of his colleagues practising inHarley Street were amazing donkeys; but he would never have allowedanyone else to say so. From the moment a man acquired that diplomawhich gave him the right over life and death, that man became, in hiseyes, an august personage for the world at large. It was a crime, hethought, for a patient not to submit to his decision, and certainly itmust be admitted that his success in the treatment of nervousdisorders had been most remarkable.
"You were at that lecture by Deboutin, of Paris, the other day!" heexclaimed to me suddenly, while I was seated at his bedside describingthe work I had been doing for him in London. "Why didn't you tell meyou were going there?"
"I went quite unexpectedly--with a friend."
"With whom?"
"Ambler Jevons."
"Oh, that detective fellow!" laughed the old physician. "Well," headded, "it was all very interesting, wasn't it?"
"Very--especially your own demonstrations. I had no idea that you werein correspondence with Deboutin."
He laughed; then, with a knowing look, said:
"Ah, my dear fellow, nowadays it doesn't do to tell anyone of your ownresearches. The only way is to spring it upon the profession as agreat triumph: just as Koch did his cure for tuberculosis. One mustcreate an impression, if only with a quack remedy. The day of thesteady plodder is past; it's all hustle, even in medicine."
"Well, you certainly did make an impression," I said, smiling. "Yourexperiments were a revelation to the profession. They were talking ofthem at the hospital only yesterday."
"H'm. They thought me an old fogey, eh? But, you see, I've beenkeeping pace with the times, Boyd. A man to succeed nowadays must makea boom with something, it matters not what. For years I've beenexperimenting in secret, and some day I will show them further resultsof my researches--and they will come upon the profession like athunderclap, staggering belief."
The old man chuckled to himself as he thought of his scientifictriumph, and how one day he would give forth to the world a truthhitherto unsuspected.
We chatted for a long time, mostly upon technicalities which cannotinterest the reader, until suddenly he said:
"I'm getting old, Boyd. These constant attacks I have render me unfitto go to town and sit in judgment on that pack of silly women who rushto consult me whenever they have a headache or an erring husband. Ithink that very soon I ought to retire. I've done sufficient hard workall the years since I was a 'locum' down in Oxfordshire. I'm wornout."
"Oh, no," I said. "You mustn't retire yet. If you did, the professionwould lose one of its most brilliant men."
"Enough of compliments," he snapped, turning wearily on his pillow."I'm sick to death of it all. Better to retire while I have fame, thanto outlive it. When I give up you will step into my shoes, Boyd, andit will be a good thing for you."
Such a suggestion was quite unexpected. I had never dreamed that hecontemplated handing over his practice to me. Certainly it would be agood thing for me if he did. It would give me a chance such as few menever had. True, I was well known to his patients and had worked hardin his interests, but that he intended to hand his practice over to meI had never contemplated. Hence I thanked him most heartily. Yes, SirBernard had been my benefactor always.
"All the women know you," he went on in his snappish way. "You are theonly man to take my place. They would come to you; but not to a newman. All I can hope is that they won't bore you with their domestictroubles--as they have done me," and he smiled.
"Oh," I said. "More than once I, too, have been compelled to listen tothe domestic secrets of certain households. It really is astonishingwhat a woman will tell her doctor, even though he may be young."
The old man laughed again.
"Ah!" he sighed. "You don't know women as I know them, Boyd. You'vegot your experience to gain. Then you'll hold them in abhorrence--justas I do. They call me a woman-hater," he grunted. "Perhaps I am--forI've had cause to hold the feminine mind and the feminine passionequally in contempt."
"Well," I laughed, "there's not a man in London who is more qualifiedto speak from personal experience than yourself. So I anticipate apretty rough time when I've had years of it, as you have."
"And yet you want to marry!" he snapped, looking me straight in theface. "Of course, you love Ethelwynn Mivart. Every man at your ageloves. It is a malady that occurs in the 'teens and declines in thethirties. I should have thought that your affection of the heart hadbeen about cured. It is surely time it was."
"It is true that I love Ethelwynn," I declared, rather annoyed, "and Iintend to marry her."
"If you do, then you'll spoil all your chances of success. The classof women who are my patients would much rather consult a confirmedbachelor than a man who has a jealous wife hanging to his coat-tails.The doctor's wife must always be a long-suffering person."
I smiled; and then our conversation turned upon his proposedretirement, which was to take place in six months' time.
I returned to London by the last train, and on entering my room founda telegram from Ambler making an appointment to call on the followingevening. The message was dated from Eastbourne, and was the first Ihad received from him for some days.
Next morning I sat in Sir Bernard's consulting-room as usual,receiving patients, and the afternoon I spent on the usual hospitalround. About six o'clock Ambler arrived, drank a brandy and soda witha reflective air, and then suggested that we might dine together atthe Cavour--a favourite haunt of his.
At table I endeavoured to induce him to explain his movements and whathe had discovered; but he was still disinclined to tell me anything.He worked always in secret, and until facts were clear said nothing.It was a peculiarity of his to remain dumb, even to his most intimatefriends concerning any inquiries he was making. He was a man of moods,with an active mind and a still tongue--two qualities essential to thesuccessful unravelling of mysteries.
Having finished dinner we lit cigars, and took a cab back to my rooms.On passing along Harley Street it suddenly occurred to me that in themorning I had left a case of instruments in Sir Bernard'sconsulting-room, and that I might require them for one of my patientsif called that night.
Therefore I stopped the cab, dismissed it, and knocked at SirBernard's door. Ford, on opening it, surprised me by announcing thathis master, whom I had left in bed on the previous night, had returnedto town suddenly, but was engaged.
Ambler waited in the hall, while I passed along to the door of theconsulting-room with the intention of asking permission to enter, as Ialways did when Sir Bernard was engaged with a patient.
On approaching the door, however, I was startled by hearing a woman'svoice raised in angry, reproachful words, followed immediately by thesound of a scuffle, and then a stifled cry. Without further hesitationI turned the handle.
The door was locked.
The Seven Secrets Page 31