Delphi Complete Works of William Dean Howells

by William Dean Howells

  “I beg your pardon,” he exclaimed. “I did n’t look at it”; but he now did so, where he held it crumpled in the palm of his left hand. “My mother said it was a young lady, and I did n’t look. Will you will you sit down, Dr. Breen?” He bustled in getting her several chairs. “I live off here in a corner, and I have never happened to meet any ladies of our profession before. Excuse me, if I spoke under a — mistaken impression. I — I — I should not have — ah — taken you for a physician. You” — He checked himself, as if he might have been going to say that she was too young and too pretty. “Of course, I shall have pleasure in consulting with you in regard to your friend’s case, though I’ve no doubt you are doing all that can be done.” With a great show of deference, he still betrayed something of the air of one who humors a joke; and she felt this, but felt that she could not openly resent it.

  “Thank you,” she returned with dignity, indicating with a gesture of her hand that she would not sit down again. “I am sorry to ask you to come so far.”

  “Oh, not at all. I shall be driving over in that direction at any rate. I’ve a patient near there.” He smiled upon her with frank curiosity, and seemed willing to detain her, but at a loss how to do so. “If I had n’t been stupid from my nap I should have inferred a scientific training from your statement of your friend’s case.” She still believed that he was laughing at her, and that this was a mock but she was still helpless to resent it, except by an assumption of yet colder state. This had apparently no effect upon Dr. Mulbridge. He continued to look at her with hardly concealed amusement, and visibly to grow more and more conscious of her elegance and style, now that she stood before him. There had been a time when, in planning her career, she had imagined herself studying a masculine simplicity and directness of address; but the over-success of some young women, her fellows at the school, in this direction had disgusted her with it, and she had perceived that after all there is nothing better for a girl, even a girl who is a doctor of medicine, than a ladylike manner. Now, however, she wished that she could do or say something aggressively mannish, for she felt herself dwindling away to the merest femininity, under a scrutiny which had its fascination, whether agreeable or disagreeable. “You must,” he said, with really unwarrantable patronage, “have found that the study of medicine has its difficulties, — you must have been very strongly drawn to it.”

  “Oh no, not at all; I had rather an aversion at first,” she replied, with the instant superiority of a woman where the man suffers any topic to become personal. “Why did you think I was drawn to it?”

  “I don’t know — I don’t know that I thought so,” he stammered. “I believe I intended to ask,” he added bluntly; but she had the satisfaction of seeing him redden, and she did not volunteer anything in his relief. She divined that it would leave him with an awkward sense of defeat if he quitted the subject there; and in fact he had determined that he would not. “Some of our ladies take up the study abroad,” he said; and he went on to speak, with a real deference, of the eminent woman who did the American name honor by the distinction she achieved in the schools of Paris.

  “I have never been abroad,” said Grace.

  “No?” he exclaimed. “I thought all American ladies had been abroad”; and now he said, with easy recognition of her resolution not to help him out, “I suppose you have your diploma from the Philadelphia school.”

  “No,” she returned, “from the New York school, — the homoeopathic school of New York.”

  Dr. Mulbridge instantly sobered, and even turned a little pale, but he did not say anything. He remained looking at her as if she had suddenly changed from a piquant mystery to a terrible dilemma.

  She moved toward the door. “Then I may expect you,” she said, “about the middle of the afternoon.”

  He did not reply; he stumbled upon the chairs in following her a pace or two, with a face of acute distress. Then he broke out with “I can’t come! I can’t consult with you!”

  She turned and looked at him with astonishment, which he did his best to meet. Her astonishment congealed into hauteur, and then dissolved into the helplessness of a lady who has been offered a rudeness; but still she did not speak. She merely looked at him, while he halted and stammered on.

  “Personally, I — I — should be — obliged — I should feel honored — I — I — It has nothing to do with your — your — being a — a — a — woman lady. I should not care for that. No. But surely you must know the reasons — the obstacles — which deter me?”

  “No, I don’t,” she said, calm with the advantage of his perturbation. “But if you refuse, that is sufficient. I will not inquire your reasons. I will simply withdraw my request.”

  “Thank you. But I beg you to understand that they have no reference whatever to you in — your own — capacity — character — individual quality. They are purely professional — that is, technical — I should say disciplinary, — entirely disciplinary. Yes, disciplinary.” The word seemed to afford Dr. Mulbridge the degree of relief which can come only from an exactly significant and luminously exegetic word.

  “I don’t at all know what you mean,” said Grace. “But it is not necessary that I should know. Will you allow me?” she asked, for Dr. Mulbridge had got between her and the door, and stood with his hand on the latch.

  His face flushed, and drops stood on his forehead. “Surely, Miss — I mean Doctor — Breen, you must know why I can’t consult with you! We belong to two diametrically opposite schools — theories — of medicine. It would be impracticable — impossible for us to consult. We could find no common ground. Have you never heard that the — ah regular practice cannot meet homoeopathists in this way? If you had told me — if I had known — you were a homoeopathist, I could n’t have considered the matter at all. I can’t now express any opinion as to your management of the case, but I have no doubt that you will know what to do — from your point of view — and that you will prefer to call in some one of your own — persuasion. I hope that you don’t hold me personally responsible for this result!”

  “Oh, no!” replied the girl, with a certain dreamy abstraction. “I had heard that you made some such distinction — I remember, now. But I could n’t realize anything so ridiculous.”

  Dr. Mulbridge colored. “Excuse me,” he said, “if, even under the circumstances, I can’t agree with you that the position taken by the regular practice is ridiculous.”

  She did not make any direct reply. “But I supposed that you only made this distinction, as you call it, in cases where there is no immediate danger; that in a matter of life and death you would waive it. Mrs. Maynard is really—”

  “There are no conditions under which I could not conscientiously refuse to waive it.”

  “Then,” cried Grace, “I withdraw the word! It is not ridiculous. It is monstrous, atrocious, inhuman!”

  A light of humorous irony glimmered in Dr. Mulbridge’s eye. “I must submit to your condemnation.”

  “Oh, it isn’t a personal condemnation!” she retorted. “I have no doubt that personally you are not responsible. We can lay aside our distinctions as allopathist and homoeopathist, and you can advise with me” —

  “It’s quite impossible,” said Dr. Mulbridge. “If I advised with you, I might be — A little while ago one of our school in Connecticut was expelled from the State Medical Association for consulting with” — he began to hesitate, as if he had not hit upon a fortunate or appropriate illustration, but he pushed on— “with his own wife, who was a physician of your school.”

  She haughtily ignored his embarrassment. “I can appreciate your difficulty, and pity any liberal-minded person who is placed as you are, and disapproves of such wretched bigotry.”

  “I am obliged to tell you,” said Dr. Mulbridge, “that I don’t disapprove of it.”

  “I am detaining you,” said Grace. “I beg your pardon. I was curious to know how far superstition and persecution can go in our day.” If the epithets were not very accurat
e, she used them with a woman’s effectiveness, and her intention made them descriptive. “Good-day,” she added, and she made a movement toward the door, from which Dr. Mulbridge retired. But she did not open the door. Instead, she sank into the chair which stood in the corner, and passed her hand over her forehead, as if she were giddy.

  Dr. Mulbridge’s finger was instantly on her wrist. “Are you faint?”

  “No, no!” she gasped, pulling her hand away. “I am perfectly well.” Then she was silent for a time before she added by a supreme effort, “I have no right to endanger another’s life, through any miserable pride, and I never will. Mrs. Maynard needs greater experience than mine, and she must have it. I can’t justify myself in the delay and uncertainty of sending to Boston. I relinquish the case. I give it to you. And I will nurse her under your direction, obediently, conscientiously. Oh!” she cried, at his failure to make any immediate response, “surely you won’t refuse to take the case!”

  “I won’t refuse,” he said, with an effect of difficult concession. “I will come. I will drive over at once, after dinner.”

  She rose now, and put her hand on the door-latch. “Do you object to my nursing your patient? She is an old school friend. But I could yield that point too, if” —

  “Oh, no, no! I shall be only too glad of your help, and your” — he was going to say advice, but he stopped himself, and repeated— “help.”

  They stood inconclusively a moment, as if they would both be glad of something more to say. Then she said tentatively, “Good-morning,” and he responded experimentally, “Good-morning”; and with that they involuntarily parted, and she went out of the door, which he stood holding open even after she had got out of the gate.

  His mother came down the stairs. “What in the world were you quarrelling with that girl about, Rufus?”

  “We were not quarrelling, mother.”

  “Well, it sounded like it. Who was she?

  “Who?” repeated her son absently. “Dr. Breen.”

  “Doctor Breen? That girl a doctor?”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought she was some saucy thing. Well, upon my word!” exclaimed Mrs. Mulbridge. “So that is a female doctor, is it? Was she sick?”

  “No,” said her son, with what she knew to be professional finality. “Mother, if you can hurry dinner a little, I shall be glad. I have to drive over to Jocelyn’s, and I should like to start as soon as possible.”

  “Who was the young man with her? Her beau, I guess.”

  “Was there a young man with her?” asked Dr. Mulbridge.

  His mother went out without speaking. She could be unsatisfactory, too.

  VI.

  No one but Mrs. Breen knew of her daughter’s errand, and when Grace came back she alighted from Mr. Libby’s buggy with an expression of thanks that gave no clew as to the direction or purpose of it. He touched his hat to her with equal succinctness, and drove away, including all the ladies on the piazza in a cursory obeisance.

  “We must ask you, Miss Gleason,” said Mrs. Alger. “Your admiration of Dr. Breen clothes you with authority and responsibility.”

  “I can’t understand it at all,” Miss Gleason confessed. “But I’m sure there’s nothing in it. He isn’t her equal. She would feel that it wasn’t right — under the circumstances.”

  “But if Mrs. Maynard was well it would be a fair game, you mean,” said Mrs. Alger.

  “No,” returned Miss Gleason, with the greatest air of candor, “I can’t admit that I meant that.”

  “Well,” said the elder lady, “the presumption is against them. Every young couple seen together must be considered in love till they prove the contrary.”

  “I like it in her,” said Mrs. Frost. “It shows that she is human, after all. It shows that she is like other girls. It’s a relief.”

  “She is n’t like other girls,” contended Miss Gleason darkly.

  “I would rather have Mr. Libby’s opinion,” said Mrs. Merritt.

  Grace went to Mrs. Maynard’s room, and told her that Dr. Mulbridge was coming directly after dinner.

  “I knew you would do it!” cried Mrs. Maynard, throwing her right arm round Grace’s neck, while the latter bent over to feel the pulse in her left. “I knew where you had gone as soon as your mother told me you had driven off with Walter Libby. I’m so glad that you’ve got somebody to consult! Your theories are perfectly right and I’m sure that Dr. Mulbridge will just tell you to keep on as you’ve been doing.”

  Grace withdrew from her caress. “Dr. Mulbridge is not coming for a consultation. He refused to consult with me.”

  “Refused to consult? Why, how perfectly ungentlemanly! Why did he refuse?”

  “Because he is an allopathist and I am a homoeopathist.”

  “Then, what is he coming for, I should like to know!”

  “I have given up the case to him,” said Grace wearily.

  “Very well, then!” cried Mrs. Maynard, “I won’t be given up. I will simply die! Not a pill, not a powder, of his will I touch! If he thinks himself too good to consult with another doctor, and a lady at that, merely because she doesn’t happen to be allopathist, he can go along! I never heard of anything so conceited, so disgustingly mean, in my life. No, Grace! Why, it’s horrid!” She was silent, and then, “Why, of course,” she added, “if he comes, I shall have to see him. I look like a fright, I suppose.”

  “I will do your hair,” said Grace, with indifference to these vows and protests; and without deigning further explanation or argument she made the invalid’s toilet for her. If given time, Mrs. Maynard would talk herself into any necessary frame of mind, and Grace merely supplied the monosyllabic promptings requisite for her transition from mood to mood. It was her final resolution that when Dr. Mulbridge did come she should give him a piece of her mind; and she received him with anxious submissiveness, and hung upon all his looks and words with quaking and with an inclination to attribute her unfavorable symptoms to the treatment of her former physician. She did not spare him certain apologies for the disorderly appearance of her person and her room.

  Grace sat by and watched him with perfectly quiescent observance. The large, somewhat uncouth man gave evidence to her intelligence that he was all physician — that he had not chosen his profession from any theory or motive, however good, but had been as much chosen by it as if he had been born a Physician. He was incredibly gentle and soft in all his movements, and perfectly kind, without being at any moment unprofitably sympathetic. He knew when to listen and when not to listen, — to learn everything from the quivering bundle of nerves before him without seeming to have learnt anything alarming; he smiled when it would do her good to be laughed at, and treated her with such grave respect that she could not feel herself trifled with, nor remember afterwards any point of neglect. When he rose and left some medicines, with directions to Grace for giving them and instructions for contingencies, she followed him from the room.

  “Well?” she said anxiously.

  “Mrs. Maynard is threatened with pneumonia. Or, I don’t know why I should say threatened,” he added; “she has pneumonia.”

  “I supposed — I was afraid so,” faltered the girl.

  “Yes.” He looked into her eyes with even more seriousness than he spoke.

  “Has she friends here?” he asked.

  “No; her husband is in Cheyenne, out on the plains.”

  “He ought to know,” said Dr. Mulbridge. “A great deal will depend upon her nursing — Miss — ah — Dr. Breen.”

  “You need n’t call me Dr. Breen,” said Grace. “At present, I am Mrs. Maynard’s nurse.”

  He ignored this as he had ignored every point connected with the interview of the morning. He repeated the directions he had already given with still greater distinctness, and, saying that he should come in the morning, drove away. She went back to Louise: inquisition for inquisition, it was easier to meet that of her late patient than that of her mother, and for once the girl spared herself.<
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  “I know he thought I was very bad,” whimpered Mrs. Maynard, for a beginning. “What is the matter with me?”

  “Your cold has taken an acute form; you will have to go to bed.”

  “Then I ‘m going to be down sick! I knew I was! I knew it! And what am I going to do, off in such a place as this? No one to nurse me, or look after Bella! I should think you would be satisfied now, Grace, with the result of your conscientiousness: you were so very sure that Mr. Libby was wanting to flirt with me that you drove us to our death, because you thought he felt guilty and was trying to fib out of it.”

  “Will you let me help to undress you?” asked Grace gently. “Bella shall be well taken care of, and I am going to nurse you myself, under Dr. Mulbridge’s direction. And once for all, Louise, I wish to say that I hold myself to blame for all” —

  “Oh, yes! Much good that does now!” Being got into bed, with the sheet smoothed under her chin, she said, with the effect of drawing a strictly logical conclusion from the premises, “Well, I should think George Maynard would want to be with his family!”

  Spent with this ordeal, Grace left her at last, and went out on the piazza, where she found Libby returned. In fact, he had, upon second thoughts, driven back, and put up his horse at Jocelyn’s, that he might be of service there in case he were needed. The ladies, with whom he had been making friends, discreetly left him to Grace, when she appeared, and she frankly walked apart with him, and asked him if he could go over to New Leyden, and telegraph to Mr. Maynard.

  “Has she asked for him?” he inquired, laughing. “I knew it would come to that.”

  “She has not asked; she has said that she thought he ought to be with his family,” repeated Grace faithfully.

  “Oh, I know how she said it: as if he had gone away wilfully, and kept away against her wishes and all the claims of honor and duty. It wouldn’t take her long to get round to that if she thought she was very sick. Is she so bad?” he inquired, with light scepticism.