Chapter XIV: Duty's Call

Faith shares the future's promise; love's
Self-offering is a triumph won;
And each good thought or action moves
The dark world nearer to the sun.

Then faint not, falter not, nor plead
Thy weakness; truth itself is strong;
The lion's strength, the eagle's speed,
Are not alone vouchsafed to wrong.

Thy nature, which through fire and flood,
To place or gain finds out its way,
Has power to seek the highest good,
And duty's holiest call obey!"
WHITTIER.

England was just at this time engaged in a contest of which Donovan very strongly disapproved, but perhaps his political views only increased the desire which had arisen within him to go out as assistant-surgeon to the seat of war. The belief that many hundreds of Englishmen were being sacrificed in an unjust cause could not fail to rouse such a lover of justice, and he lost no time in making arrangements with an ambulance society which was sending out help, and was in want of assistants. Charles Osmond, on the whole, approved of his choice, though regretting very much that he should for some time lose sight of him; but he felt that the life of action would be quite in Donovan's line, and that the entire change of scene would be good for him. Brian would have been only too glad to join him, but his work was already cut out for him in London, where he was to take the place of junior partner to an uncle of his who had a large practice in the Bloomsbury district.

It so chanced that Stephen Causton, who had been hindered both by illness and idleness, went in for his final examination at the same time. All three passed successfully. The autumn had been a very busy one, but Donovan was well and in good spirits, eager to begin his fresh life, and too much engrossed with the present and future to let the past weigh upon him. Still, as one January day he went in to St. Thomas's to take leave of Trevethan, not even his strong will could prevent a few very sad thoughts arising as he spoke of Porthkerran and the Tremains. Trevethan's recovery had been very slow, but he was now really well, and it had been arranged that he should go down to Porthkerran with his little girl the following week. His illness, and the kindness he had met with, had softened him very much, and though his manner was still brusque in the extreme, no one who really knew the man could have doubted his gratitude. In his odd fashion he half worshipped Donovan, and it was really from the desire to please him that he had overcome his shame and reluctance, and written to ask his father to receive him again. The blacksmith's intense happiness was so evident from the ill-spelt but warmly expressed reply, that Trevethan the younger began to feel drawn to him, and to look forward to his return with less apprehension and more eagerness.

Having left him directions as to fetching little Gladys from the Osmonds, Donovan took leave of him and went home to make his final preparations, a trifle saddened by the conversation. But after all, he reasoned with himself, he had more cause for rejoicing, for he had certainly been of use to one of the Porthkerran villagers, and Gladys would be heartily pleased to hear old Trevethan's good news. To have helped even indirectly to please her was something to be thankful for; besides, had he not renounced the thought of personal happiness as such? had he not chosen the way of sacrifice and willed to find his happiness in serving his fellow-men? And then once more he returned with all his former eagerness to the anticipation of his coming work, work which bid fair to call out all his faculties, and which made his pulses beat quicker even to think of, for perhaps no one but an awakened misanthropist can feel with such keenness the delights of the enthusiasm of humanity.

His key was in the latch when the sound of a carriage stopping at the door made him glance round; to his utter astonishment he saw his mother. He hurried forward, surprise and not unnatural emotion in his look and manner.

"Why, mother! this is very good of you," he exclaimed, helping her to alight.

"My dear Donovan!" she said, in a hurried nervous voice, "let me come in to your rooms for a minute, I am in dreadful trouble."

He brought her into the little sitting-room and made her sit down by the fire, perplexed by her agitation. It was many years since they had met, and time had altered Mrs. Farrant, she looked worn and faded; there was something piteous in the alteration. Donovan bent down and kissed the once beautiful face with a sort of reverence which he had never felt before.

"How did you get leave to come to me?" he asked.

Then Mrs. Farrant's tears began to flow.

"Oh! the most terrible thing has happened," she said, vainly trying to check her sobs. "Ellis, your cousin, has been unwell for some days, and this morning the doctor declares that he has small-pox, and if you will believe it, I have actually been in his room the whole time! they said I had better leave for Oakdene, but I am so unnerved, so shaken, I thought you would take me to the station and arrange things. I thought I should like to see you and tell you. Oh! Donovan, do you think I shall take it? do you think it is infectious at the beginning?"

It was the same selfish nature, the same incapability of thinking of the well-being of others, which had caused Donovan so much pain all through his life. His mother was, after all, only altered externally. The hard look of his childhood came back into his face.

"Then you mean to go to Oakdene and leave your husband?" he asked, with a severity in his voice which he could not disguise.

"Don't be hard on me," she sobbed, "I have such a horror of this; if it were fever I would have stayed, but small-pox! No, no, it is impossible, I must go, I must indeed. Besides, I am not strong enough to nurse him. The doctor will send a trained nurse. Indeed! you must not urge me to go back, Donovan, it would kill me."

Her agony of distress made him reproach himself for having spoken so strongly; he paced the room in silence. It was unnatural of her to leave her husband, but yet there was truth in her words, she would be absolutely useless as a nurse, and her nervous terror would very likely render her liable to infection. Besides, what right had he to judge her? He could not trust himself to discuss the right and wrong of the question, he felt that he must leave it to her own conscience, and when he spoke it was merely to ask details of Ellis's state, and the doctor's opinion of it.

"You had better rest here for a little time," he said, when she had answered his questions in her unsatisfactory way. "It must have been a great shock to you!" He spoke in a very different tone now, and Mrs. Farrant, feeling all the comfort of having a stronger will to repose upon, allowed herself to be made comfortable on the sofa, and lay silently watching her son's movements with a sort of interested curiosity, like a placid patient watching the preparations of a dentist, or a sleepy child following with its eyes the nurse as she sets the room in order for the night. Her son was very much altered; he still set about everything in the same quiet methodical way, but his angles had been rounded off, and the bitter cynicism which had always alarmed and repulsed her seemed quite gone. He had taken paper and ink and was writing hurriedly; presently he pushed his chair back from the table, and folding the written sheet, came towards her.

"I am just going to the hospital, and then to the telegraph-office with this," he said. "I have ordered Mrs. Doery to have everything ready for you. Presently I think you must let me vaccinate you. It is something new to have a doctor in the family, isn't it?"

"I'm only so shocked that you should have been driven to it," sighed Mrs. Farrant. "You should have gone into the army. You have grown so like your father, Donovan."

He bent down once more and kissed her. Then, promising she should not be disturbed, he hurried away with the telegram.

"So like your father!" The words rang in his ears, but never had he felt farther from any likeness to the noble, calm, self-governed man whose image stood out so clearly in his memory, the three days' intercourse with the pure mind having left a deeper impress than months and years of intercourse with those of lower type. But just now his mind was in a seething chaos, his whole world shaken, whether by conflicting duties or conflicting passions he hardly knew, only he feared it was the latter. Rapidly walking along the crowded streets he tried to fight the battle out, mechanically taking off his hat to an acquaintance, mechanically going through his business as people must do even when the deadliest mental conflict is raging, even when--perhaps unknown to them--the decision for good or evil, for life or death is hanging in the balance. Previous arrangement and strong inclination drew him almost irresistibly towards the fulfilment of his engagement to the ambulance. Of course other men would willingly take his place at a day's notice, but his whole mind was set on going out to the war, the thought of foregoing it was almost unendurable. And yet a perverse voice within him kept urging on him that others might go out to the war, but that he was the only man called to take charge of a poor neglected wretch in a certain West-End Square.

Yet did not the fellow deserve his fate? Donovan would have suddenly changed natures if the justice of the thing had not struck him. Was it not perfectly satisfactory? Here was Nemesis at last--his foe would be justly punished! And then, being exceedingly human, he drew one of those fascinating little mind pictures which, if delineated by men, are certainly engraved by the devil. In this picture self, the hero, went out to the war, won unheard of honours, received honourable wounds, and then was greeted with the news that his enemy had perished miserably in a luxurious house which he had no right to be in. "So like your father," with the sharpest satire the words again rang in his ears.

God be thanked that the devil's alluring pictures cannot stand side by side with the image of a true, noble, whole-hearted man! God be thanked that the ideal man has lightened the world's darkness!

Donovan's struggle was by no means over by the time he returned to his mother; it raged all the time that he was attending to her, all the time that he talked quiet commonplaces, brought her tea and toast and all that the house would afford, soothed her nervous terrors as to infection, and quoted small-pox statistics.

"Could you not come down with me to Oakdene?" said Mrs. Farrant, suddenly. "You say your course is over, why not come with me now?"

He knew then that the supreme moment had come.

"I will see you safely into the train," he said; "but I can't come to Oakdene."

"Why not?" urged Mrs. Farrant.

There was a minute's silence, then, as quietly as if he had been speaking of an afternoon stroll, Donovan replied,

"Because I'm going round to Connaught Square presently."

Mrs. Farrant stared at him. Perhaps he hardly felt inclined just then for inquiry or argument; muttering some excuse, he left the room, drew a long breath, and walked slowly upstairs.

In his bed-room were all the preparations for the coming journey--travelling gear, books, instruments; he felt a sharp pang as he realised that all his plans were changed--perhaps there was even a slight fear lest his resolution should be shaken, for he began to toss some clothes into a portmanteau in a hurried and unmethodical way quite unnatural to him; but he quieted down as he took Dot's miniature from its place. For a minute he looked at it intently, and afterwards there was no more haste in his manner.

Mrs. Farrant could not resist questioning him when he came downstairs again.

"Do you really think you are wise to go?" she urged. "Why put yourself to such a risk?"

"You forget I am a doctor," he said, smiling a little.

Mrs. Farrant of course knew nothing of her husband's real treachery, but she knew that he and Donovan were sworn foes, and could not understand her son's resolution.

"But he has a trained nurse," she continued, "and I should have thought that, disliking each other as you do, it would be unlikely that you could do much for him; he may not like to have you there."

"Possibly," said Donovan, "but I must go and see."

"And then you will have been in the way of infection for nothing," urged his mother. "Come, change your mind. Why must you go?"

"Because it is right," said Donovan; and there was something in his tone which kept Mrs. Farrant from further objections.

She looked uneasy and troubled; perhaps for the first time it struck her that there could be an absolute right and wrong in such a question--perhaps she was a little doubtful about her own conduct. It was at any rate with a feeling of relief that she parted with Donovan at the Paddington Station, for people whose consciences are just enough awake to know that they are half asleep never feel comfortable with those who have and obey an imperative conscience.

When the Greyshot train had started, Donovan hurried off to make arrangements with the ambulance, to hunt up a substitute, to find the old captain and tell him his change of plans, to write notes, give orders, and make Waif understand the parting. How much he disliked it all, how intensely he shrank from the work before him, he hardly allowed himself time to think.

Late that evening, as Charles Osmond was sitting in his study hard at work over the parish accounts, Brian hurried in, an open letter in his hand.

"Just look here!" he exclaimed, too full of his subject to notice that he interrupted his father half-way up a column. "Would you have believed the fellow could have thrown it all up?"

Charles Osmond held out his hand for the note, and read as follows:--

"DEAR BRIAN,

"After all, I'm not going south. Smithson was only too thankful to step into my shoes, and will sail on Friday. If you can, get him to trade for some of my goodly Babylonish garments, as I can't well sport them in England. I only saw him for five minutes this afternoon, when we'd other matters to talk over. Ellis Farrant is down with small-pox, and I'm going to see after him. Look in now and then on Waif and the captain, if you can; they are in the depths.

"Ever yours,
"D. F."

"My grand old Roman!" exclaimed Charles Osmond, half aloud. "You've grown a good deal since the day we climbed Snowdon."

"But it's such folly to throw up this just at the last moment," said Brian. "Besides, he's fagged with the exam, and now, instead of having the voyage to set him up, he goes straight into this plague-house all for the sake of one wretched man."

"You may be quite sure that Donovan was very certain of the right before he took such a step," said Charles Osmond; "he's not the sort of fellow to change his mind or his plans lightly, whereas you----" He laughed and shrugged his shoulders.

Brian smiled too, for it was the family proverb that he was the most impetuous and impulsive of mortals.