Part 95 (1/2)
The song was in the mouths of the people that year. She laughed, and rubbed her pale cheek against his.
”You be my eyes, deer. Peep and see if the Doctor is in 'is room.”
It was ten o'clock on a s.h.i.+ning May morning, and the clouds that raced over great grimy London were white, and there were patches of blue between. The trees in the squares were dressed in new green leaves, and the irises and ranunculuses in the parks were out, and the policemen had shed their heavy uniforms, and instead of hyacinths behind the gla.s.s there were pots of tulips in bloom upon the window-sills of the two rooms over the garage. And the Doctor, who had been seeing patients ever since nine, was sitting at the writing-table, said W. Keyse, with his 'ead upon 'is 'ands.
”Like as if 'e was tired, deer, or un'appy? Or tired an un'appy both?”
”Stryte, you 'ave it!” admitted W. Keyse, after cautious inspection.
”The Doctor--don't let 'im see you lookin' at 'im, darlin', or 'e might think, which Good Gracious know how wrong it 'ud be, as you was a kind o'
Peepin' Pry--the Doctor 'ave fell orf an' chynged a good deal lately--in 'is looks, I mean!” said Mrs. Keyse, tucking in the corner of the flannel over the little downy head. ”Wasted in 'is flesh, like--got 'oller round the eyes----”
”So 'e 'as!” W. Keyse whistled and slapped his leg. ”An' I bin' noticin'
it on me own for a long while back--now I come to think of it. Woddyou pipe's the matter wiv 'im? Not ill? Lumme! if 'e was ill----” The eyes of W. Keyse became circular with consternation.
”No, no, deer!” She rea.s.sured him, in his ignorance that the maladies of the soul are more agonising far than those that afflict the body.
”Down'arted, like, an' 'opeless an'--an' lonely----”
Downhearted, and hopeless, and lonely! The jaw of W. Keyse dropped, and his ugly eyes became circular with sheer astonishment.
”_Him!_ Wiv a beautiful 'ouse to live in--an' Carriage Toffs with t.i.tles fair beggin' 'im to come an' feel their pulses an' be pyde for it, an'
Scientific Inst.i.tooshuns an' 'Orspital Committees fightin' to git 'im on their staffs--an' all the pypers praisin' 'im for wot 'e done at Gueldersdorp, an' Government tippin' 'im the 'Ow Do? an' thank you kindly, Mister!--an'----” W. Keyse could only suppose that Mrs. Keyse was playing a bit of gaff on hers truly--”and him with a wife, too! Married an'
'appy, an' goin' to be 'appier yet!” He pointed to the little red snub nose peeping between the folds of the flannel. ”When a little nipper like that comes----”
She reddened, paled, burst out crying.
”O William! William----”
Her William kissed her, and dried her tears. He called it mopping her dial, but you have not forgotten that, as the upper house-and-parlour-maid had at first said, both Her and Him were plainly descended from the Lowest Circles. She had melted afterwards, on learning that Mrs. Keyse had been actually mentioned in Despatches for carrying tea under fire to the prisoners at the Fort; had sought her society, lent paper-patterns, and imparted, in confidence, what she knew of the secret of Saxham's wedded life.
”Dear William! My good, kind Love! Best I should 'urt you, deer, if 'urt you 'ave to be. You see them three large winders covered wiv lovely lace?”
”'Ers--Mrs. Saxham's!” He nodded, trying to look wise.
”Yes, darlin'. Mrs. Saxham's bedroom and dressin'-room they belongs to.
I've bin inside the bedroom wiv the upper 'ouse-an'-parlour-myde, an' a Fairy Princess in a Drury Lane Pantomime might 'ave a bigger place to sleep in--but not a beautifuller. When the Foreign Young Person come in of evenin's to git 'er lady dressed for dinner, she snaps up the lights, bein' a kind soul, before she draws the blinds, to give me a charnst like, to see in.” She stroked the tweed sleeve. ”An' once or twice Mrs. Saxham 'as come in before they'd bin pull down, an' then--O William!--there was everythink in that room on Gawd's good earth a 'usband could ask for to make 'im 'appy, except the wife's 'art beatin' warm and lovin' in the middle of it all!”
”Cripps!... You don't never mean ...?” He gasped. ”Wot? Don't the Doctor make no odds to 'er? A Man Like That?” ...
She clung to the heart that loved her, and told him what she had heard....
And if Saxham had known how two of the unconscious actors in his shadow-play pitied him, the knowledge would have been as vitriol poured into an open wound.
LXIII
The card of Major Bingham Wrynche, C.B., was brought to Saxham one morning, as, his early-calling patients seen and dismissed, the Doctor was going out to his waiting motor-brougham.