Chapter XIX

WHEN Bennett hurried down to the surgery, she calculated that it would be untenanted, as the dinner-gong had sounded a few minutes before. All seemed quiet when she reached the door, and after a brief pause, she turned the handle very softly and entered.

To her surprise, Dr. Crawford looked up from the desk at which he was writing, and said, "What do you want, nurse? Anything amiss with the children?"

"No, sir; I am glad to say they are all right. It's only my face-ache come on again, and I was just going to ask Mr. Armstrong for a drop of laudanum, as I want to foment it after the children are asleep."

As Bennett spoke, she placed her hand to her cheek, and put on a doleful look, as if she were in great pain. Out of the surgery was a smaller apartment, which could only be entered from it. In this were kept all drugs except those of a very simple character, and Mr. Armstrong was accustomed to mix the medicines there, in order that any risk of mistake through interruption might be avoided.

He was in the drug-room at the moment of Bennett's entrance, and within hearing of her words, though out of sight. He had just completed his task, and, stepping into the surgery, he said, rather severely, "You had laudanum from me very lately. If you are wanting more, you must have used a larger quantity than was necessary."

"You are quite right, sir. I had the laudanum, and should have it now,—at least, some of it,—but I had the misfortune to break the bottle a few minutes since. I had put it away most carefully, as was right where there are children, for if they think you want them not to get at a thing, they'll climb like kittens to see what it is. The bottle was rolled up in some rags and a towel, and put away on a high shelf; but I happened to catch the end, dropped the bottle, and smashed it to atoms."

"Where are the pieces?" asked Mr. Armstrong suspiciously.

"Where they should be, sir—melting down in the middle of the fire. I suppose you wouldn't have me leave those on the nursery floor, or the spilled laudanum either? If you will come up-stairs you can see where I have washed the floor, for it cannot be dry yet, and smell the laudanum too."

There was no gainsaying Bennett's statement, and the woman knew it. Looking straight at Dr. Crawford, she said, "May I have a little laudanum, sir? It will be quite safe in my hands, you know."

She was not prepared for the doctor's decided negative, qualified however by a promise that he would give her some medicine which would have a more lasting effect than the outward applications on which she relied for ease.

"It is plain that you want something to remove the cause of the pain, Bennett," said Dr. Crawford kindly. "Come and see me later in the evening I am hoping not to go out again, and in order to be quite free, I had dinner put off for ten minutes, so that Mr. Armstrong and I might finish a rather pressing matter, and take our meal with quiet consciences."

"I am sure, sir, I would rather not be the means of disturbing you after dinner," said Bennett.

But the doctor did not wait for her to finish.

"Come here at eight o'clock," he replied. "I shall not call it an interruption to look after your face-ache, and, I hope, relieve it permanently."

The doctor passed out, and Mr. Armstrong waited for Bennett to follow, then locked the door with a very decided click, and put the key into his pocket. There was no tampering with that lock, as the nurse well knew, and no chance for her to purchase any drug at the shop of a Shelverton chemist without exciting suspicion, so she returned to the nursery in no very good humour.

For once, Dr. Crawford was undisturbed during dinner. And to Ida's delight, he thoroughly enjoyed the meal, then accompanied her and Grace into the drawing-room, and asked for some music.

"Sing for us, Ida," he said; "I have had very little music of late, and I want to make the most of my opportunity. When you have set a good example, I hope Grace will play or sing something, and Armstrong can join in a part-song."

Grace promised to do her best, but pleaded that her busy life gave her but little time for the practice of difficult pieces. Nevertheless, it oozed out that she played the organ at church, and trained the village choir—not a very easy task when scarcely any of the members knew their notes so as to read the music.

"How can you teach them? Are not your ears and patience terribly tried?" asked Mrs. Crawford, on finding that Grace played the parts over again and again, until her pupils mastered them by ear.

"At first it was hard work, but I remembered that it must be quite as trying to the learners as to myself," replied Grace. "They are improving now, and I have a class apart from the other practice, and am teaching them to sing by note, so each week will make it easier for both sides."

Grace played and sang when her turn came, and, though she came far behind her hostess in brilliancy and style, she attempted nothing that had she could not perform, and showed that she had a fine voice, and used it with true musical taste.

Time passed quickly, and for once Dr. Crawford forgot his appointment with Bennett, until a chiming clock on the mantelpiece told him that he was already half an hour too late.

"I must ask to be excused for a few moments," he said. "Bennett came to ask for something just before dinner, and I promised to see her in the surgery at eight. I shall blame you, who have made me insensible to the flight of time, for not having kept my word."

Ida was surprised, and stopped her husband to ask what Bennett complained of. He told her all that had passed in the surgery, and for the first time she felt uneasy, and Jean Graham's warning came to her mind with double force.

The doctor did not wait for his wife to ask any further questions, but after a few moments of perplexed silence she addressed Grace, who was the only person left with her.

"Bennett made no complaint when we were in the nursery half an hour before she went to the doctor. Did you think she was looking ill?"

"Having never seen her before, I could scarcely judge," replied Grace. "I thought she seemed confused, only she explained the reason, and—"

"And what, dear?" said Ida, who noticed that Grace hesitated.

"Perhaps I ought not to say it, but I fancied Bennett was not pleased at my being taken into the nursery."

"That is likely enough," replied Mrs. Crawford; "Bennett almost turns me out sometimes. These first-class nurses are often very touchy, and so are cooks sometimes. Jean Graham, who is cook-housekeeper, is an exception. She has always been anxious for me to look into every corner, and to choose my own time for doing it."

"I suppose such servants as Bennett stand more on their dignity than ours do, for instance. But then we have only two, and, as my help is needed in each department, I am in and out of kitchen, nursery, and dairy at all hours of the day. Of course, our servants are not of the same class as yours, but they do a great deal of work, and well, for our house and family are large."

"I do not know about class," said Ida thoughtfully; "I should be inclined to consider those you mention as very superior servants indeed. Your laundry work goes out, of course?"

"Not a scrap of it," replied Grace. "We have a woman for two days to help the servants. She is the wife of our man, who combines in his own person the offices of groom, coachman, gardener, and whatever else is comprehended in the term 'generally useful.' He is a marvel of handiness and good temper, and even helps in the mangling. I do my share of the ironing, and sometimes all the mending. I daresay these particulars sound dreadfully matter-of-fact to you," continued Grace, looking up at Ida, with a merry little laugh, and a face to which the blush of false shame was a stranger; "but our housekeeping is of necessity so different from yours. We have to calculate sixpences, and we cannot afford to have any idle hands at the rectory."

"I am afraid you think we have a good many idle hands here," replied Mrs. Crawford. "My own, especially, seem terribly useless when compared with yours."

"Oh, please do not think I meant to say anything of the kind!" said Grace, blushing violently. "I express myself so badly. I only meant to say that we are obliged to be very economical, in order to keep our expenditure within proper limits. My father's income from the living is good, and he has private means; but just think what it must be to have nine children to provide for! Only two boys have left school yet, and though the elder got an exhibition, it does not quite cover his college expenses. The second is in a merchant's office, and has a small salary, but he too needs help."

"I was not offended, Grace dear," replied Ida; "on the contrary, I am very much interested in listening to these details of your home life. I think it is very good of you to speak so frankly, and I feel like a perfect child at household management, whilst you seem to know everything about it. I wish I had been trained as you have. I think I shall ask you to teach me a little whilst you are here," said Mrs. Crawford.

"I will do anything you wish me to do," answered Grace warmly. "As to the training, I am not sure that you would have liked it, though no doubt it comes in very useful in after-life. I am not hypocrite enough to pretend that I always find my work pleasant, even after being trained to it as long as I can remember anything. But when it has to be done, one may just as well do it heartily and cheerfully. If I were to look sulky at a great pile of things that need mending, or give cross answers to the poor children and make them miserable, where would be the good to myself? All the ill-tempers possible would not fill a hole in a stocking, and if I made other people less happy by my sulks, should I not be doubly miserable?"

"Certainly you would," said Ida, with a smile at her young guest's earnestness. "But all this work must stand very much in the way of visiting and recreation?"

"Well, yes. I have a good fight sometimes when I very much wish to accept an invitation, and conscience insists on my saying 'No' to it. I have several helps, though, and if the 'No' lingers sometimes, it comes out at last; and once said, there is an end of the matter. I am of a far too stubborn nature to change after having made up my mind."

"What are the helps, Grace? I should like to know, in case I have to fall back upon them whilst I am taking lessons from you," said Ida.

"They would not all be available in your case," was the reply. "It is a help to look into my dear mother's sweet face, and to think of the daily example she sets me by her patience under suffering and confinement. She who was once so active and helpful has to spend so much of her life on one spot, yet she never murmurs or darkens our days by constantly bringing to view the shadow that has fallen on her own. Then there is my father to think of. My mother cannot meet him with words of welcome, so I must be her deputy, so far. And though it gives me more work, it is sweet to hear him say,—

"'Gracie, you must do this or that for me; you are my right-hand. What should I do without you, my child?'

"As to the children, they are dear good little things, and of course they look to me at all times, and for every kind of service. It is a help to hear them say,—

"'Gracie, I love you dearly!'

"And to feel their chubby arms clinging round my neck as if they could not part with me. Then there is the best help of all," added the girl softly. "But you know all about it without my telling."

"What do you mean, dear?" inquired Ida.

"The help that comes in answer to prayer. All the rest would be useless without it, you know, dear Mrs. Crawford. I feel impatient, discontented, disinclined for duty. The hasty, unkind words are trembling on my lips many a time, and if they are not uttered, and the work which God has given me left undone, it is just because He hears my cry for help and strength, and does not leave me to myself."

Grace paused, for her voice trembled with emotion caused by the memory of past struggles; but there was a glad, bright look on her face, which told Mrs. Crawford how real a thing was this blessed sense of an ever-present help that could be had for the asking.

There was no time for further conversation. Dr. Crawford returned to the drawing-room, and his wife immediately inquired, "How did you find Bennett? I hope there is nothing seriously amiss with her. She made no complaint to me, though Grace and I were in the nursery half an hour before dinner. Was she annoyed at having been kept waiting?"

"She had not been down-stairs," said the doctor. "Instead of coming, she sent a message to say that the children were so cross that she could not leave them, but that her face was much less painful."

"I knew that Ann was gone out, so there would only be Bennett to look after them. I daresay she would not speak about the pain in her face to me, because she knew that Miss Steyne had just arrived. She would be afraid that I should feel uneasy on her account, and yet be unwilling to leave my visitor," said Mrs. Crawford. "No wonder poor Bennett did not look very amiable, Grace," she added; "face-ache is very trying to the temper."

Grace assented; but she could not help feeling that Bennett was by no means the person to whose tender mercies she would like to entrust the little ones at the rectory.

"I have seen Bennett," said the doctor. "As she could not come to me, I went to her. I could not find out that there was much the matter with her, and, as she assured me that the pain was entirely gone, I ordered her some simple medicine, which Armstrong is preparing, and bade her use no external application without first consulting me. Ann returned whilst I was in the nursery, and the children were settling down quietly enough."

"I am glad to hear it," said Mrs. Crawford; "I suppose I had better not go up to them now."

The doctor assented, and soon afterwards Mr. Armstrong entered the drawing-room, and there was more singing, in which he joined. But Grace noticed that there was no longer the same look of enjoyment on Dr. Crawford's face. And she said to herself, "His mind is preoccupied. Something has occurred to disturb it."

Grace was more quick-sighted than Ida, for the latter, satisfied by her husband's account of Bennett, turned to the piano and began to play the accompaniment of a part-song, in which the four joined; and the rest of the evening passed quickly and pleasantly enough.

Dr. Crawford was uneasy, though his wife did not discover this, and Bennett's conduct was the cause of his anxiety. Before he went up to see the nurse, Mr. Armstrong had made him acquainted with the woman's previous visits to the surgery, and her abstraction of laudanum, as well as the plausible manner in which she had excused herself, and enlisted the sympathies of her mistress.

"You would notice," he continued, "that Bennett came stealthily to the door this evening, and at a time when she no doubt thought that we should have left the surgery. If we had left it, she would still have been disappointed, as I determined, after her last visit, never again to give her a chance of entering it in my absence. I blamed myself for having left the keys hanging in the surgery, and the outer door unfastened, though that of the drug-room was locked. I thought there were only trustworthy people about the place, and never dreamed that any one would be so daring as to take down the keys, unlock the inner door, and tamper with the drugs. Before I caught Bennett the first time, I had been much puzzled by once finding the laudanum bottle on the surgery table after a short absence. I had used a small quantity of the drug in making up some medicine, but I felt certain I had never taken the bottle from the drug-room. You know it is my fixed habit never to leave bottle, case, or drawer out of its place for one moment after I have taken from it what I require at the time, and for the single purpose."

Dr. Crawford was too well acquainted with the methodical habits of his assistant to doubt the accuracy of his statements. When, in addition to his own knowledge of Bennett's movements, Mr. Armstrong mentioned Jean Graham's suspicions, the doctor was rendered still more uneasy, and the visit to the nursery did not tend to allay the feeling. A careful examination of the nurse's face convinced him that she was playing a part, and pretending to be in pain when really nothing ailed her.

But why should she do this? Why be anxious to obtain possession of the laudanum, if she did not need it for fomentation? Here was the puzzle; and Dr. Crawford determined to keep a careful watch on Bennett's movements; but, as Graces Steyne was present, he did not mention his suspicions to his wife.