第290章

"Simply this. I think it important that perfectly respectable and perfectly disinterested witnesses should see you, in my house, in the character of a lady who has come to consult me.""Your motive seems rather far-fetched, Is it the only motive you have in the matter?""My dear, dear lady!" remonstrated the doctor, "have I any concealments from _you?_ Surely, you ought to know me better than that?""Yes," she said, with a we ary contempt. "It's dull enough of me not to understand you by this time. Send word upstairs when I am wanted." She left him, and went back to her room.

Two o'clock came; and in a quarter of an hour afterward the visitors had arrived. Short as the notice had been, cheerless as the Sanitarium looked to spectators from without, the doctor's invitation had been largely accepted, nevertheless, by the female members of the families whom he had addressed. In the miserable monotony of the lives led by a large section of the middle classes of England, anything is welcome to the women which offers them any sort of harmless refuge from the established tyranny of the principle that all human happiness begins and ends at home.

While the imperious needs of a commercial country limited the representatives of the male sex, among the doctor's visitors, to one feeble old man and one sleepy little boy, the women, poor souls, to the number of no less than sixteen--old and young, married and single--had seized the golden opportunity of a plunge into public life. Harmoniously united by the two common objects which they all had in view--in the first place, to look at each other, and, in the second place, to look at the Sanitarium--they streamed in neatly dressed procession through the doctor's dreary iron gates, with a thin varnish over them of assumed superiority to all unladylike excitement, most significant and most pitiable to see!

The proprietor of the Sanitarium received his visitors in the hall with Miss Gwilt on his arm. The hungry eyes of every woman in the company overlooked the doctor as if no such person had existed; and, fixing on the strange lady, devoured her from head to foot in an instant.

"My First Inmate," said the doctor, presenting Miss Gwilt. "This lady only arrived late last night; and she takes the present opportunity (the only one my morning's engagements have allowed me to give her) of going over the Sanitarium.--Allow me, ma'am,"he went on, releasing Miss Gwilt, and giving his arm to the eldest lady among the visitors. "Shattered nerves--domestic anxiety," he whispered, confidentially. "Sweet woman! sad case!"He sighed softly, and led the old lady across the hall.

The flock of visitors followed, Miss Gwilt accompanying them in silence, and walking alone--among them, but not of them--the last of all.

"The grounds, ladies and gentlemen," said the doctor, wheeling round, and addressing his audience from the foot of the stairs, "are, as you have seen, in a partially unfinished condition.

Under any circumstances, I should lay little stress on the grounds, having Hampstead Heath so near at hand, and carriage exercise and horse exercise being parts of my System. In a lesser degree, it is also necessary for me to ask your indulgence for the basement floor, on which we now stand. The waiting-room and study on that side, and the Dispensary on the other (to which Ishall presently ask your attention), are completed. But the large drawing-room is still in the decorator's hands. In that room (when the walls are dry--not a moment before) my inmates will assemble for cheerful society. Nothing will be spared that can improve, elevate, and adorn life at these happy little gatherings. Every evening, for example, there will be music for those who like it."At this point there was a faint stir among the visitors. A mother of a family interrupted the doctor. She begged to know whether music "every evening" included Sunday evening; and, if so, what music was performed?

"Sacred music, of course, ma'am," said the doctor. "Handel on Sunday evening--and Haydn occasionally, when not too cheerful.

But, as I was about to say, music is not the only entertainment offered to my nervous inmates. Amusing reading is provided for those who prefer books."There was another stir among the visitors. Another mother of a family wished to know whether amusing reading meant novels.

"Only such novels as I have selected and perused myself, in the first instance," said the doctor. "Nothing painful, ma'am! There may be plenty that is painful in real life; but for that very reason, we don't want it in books. The English novelist who enters my house (no foreign novelist will be admitted) must understand his art as the healthy-minded English reader understands it in our time. He must know that our purer modern taste, our higher modern morality, limits him to doing exactly two things for us, when he writes us a book. All we want of him is--occasionally to make us laugh; and invariably to make us comfortable."There was a third stir among the visitors--caused plainly this time by approval of the sentiments which they had just heard. The doctor, wisely cautious of disturbing the favorable impression that he had produced, dropped the subject of the drawing-room, and led the way upstairs. As before, the company followed; and, as before, Miss Gwilt walked silently behind them, last of all.

One after another the ladies looked at her with the idea of speaking, and saw something in her face, utterly unintelligible to them, which checked the well-meant words on their lips. The prevalent impression was that the Principal of the Sanitarium had been delicately concealing the truth, and that his first inmate was mad.

The doctor led the way--with intervals of breathing-time accorded to the old lady on his arm--straight to the top of the house.