King of the Castle

“Claude, dear, shall I shut the window now? Isn’t it too cool on a night like this?”

Claude turned to her, and looked rather vacantly in her face.

“The tide is going out fast, Mary,” she said, in a low, dreamy whisper. “Don’t you ever feel that there may be some truth in what they say, that people who are near the end pass away from us with the falling tide?”

“Claudie, dear, are you going to be ill?”

“I hope not.”

“And so do I; but do you know you are talking a lot of dreamy nonsense, such as is most distressing at a time like this. We haven’t got anybody near the end. Oh, what nonsense! It’s all old-fashioned silliness.”

Claude shook her head.

“No,” she said, “there is something in it all, Mary, and to-night it is as if some great trouble were coming upon us.”

“Are you going to set up for a prophetess, dear?”

“Shall we go down and see how my father is, Mary?”

“And insult Dr Asher by setting his commands at defiance. No; I am going to sit here patiently till morning, unless he sends word to us that uncle has woke up, and that he has gone to bed like a Christian. Claude, dear, your father must be a very unhappy man.”

“Then it is our duty to try and make him happy.”

“By doing everything he wishes us to do?”

Claude felt the hot blood flush into her cheeks again and she made no reply. She only turned to look out at the broad path of light stretching far away over the sea, and, as the water murmured about the rocks, it was as if some solemn spell of silence had fallen upon them, influencing Mary so that she ceased speaking, leaving the bantering remarks ready, unsaid. Claude put her arm around her cousin, and laid her head upon her shoulder, thinking of the words that had been spoken, and of why they were sitting up, till her heart almost sank, and the sea began to be to her full of strange whisperings and portents of some trouble to come.

And so hour after hour glided by, till they were chilled by the cold night air, but neither moved till they were electrified by a quick, light tapping on the door, which was opened before they could reach it, and from out of the darkness came a husky voice which sounded familiar.

“Come down, Miss Claude, at once.”

“Ah! Woodham? How is he?”

“Don’t ask me, my dear, but make haste down. You may be wanted. Doctor Asher wishes me to go and fetch Doctor Rixton.”

“But why? What for?”

“Miss Claude, dear, don’t ask me,” said the woman, in suffocating tones, as she turned slowly away.

Claude hurriedly followed her down toward the study door, where she stood trembling for a few moments, feeling that there had then been a meaning in the portent which had troubled her that night. Then, turning the handle, she went into the room.

“Well, back so soon?” said the doctor, whose face was from her. “Is he coming?”

“Doctor Asher.”

“You, Miss Gartram!” he said, in a hoarse whisper, as he turned sharply round. “What is it? Why have you come?”

“Woodham called me. What is the matter? Is he worse?”

“Hush!” said the doctor, in a hurried way, as he took her hand. “Don’t be agitated. We must hope for the best, and – ”

“Then he is worse,” cried Claude, breaking from him and running to her father’s side, but only to shrink back.

For the light had been shifted so that it should fall upon Gartram’s fixed, stern face, in which she read so terrible a reality that it was as if a hand of ice had clutched her heart, paralysing thought and action, so that she stood there with staring eyes and parted lips, feeling that she was in the presence of death.

Then the reaction came, and, uttering a gasp, her womanly, helpful nature came to the front.

“I am not a child,” she said in a quick, passionate voice. “Tell me; how is this? When was he taken worse? Doctor Asher, why don’t you speak to me? Tell me what I can do to help.”

He shook his head.

“I am doing everything possible, and have sent Mrs Woodham for Doctor Rixton to share the responsibility.”

Claude caught him in turn by the wrist, drew him right to the far side of the room, by the panel of the bookshelves which formed the masked door, and in a whisper, as if she were afraid that her father should hear, she said —

“Is he dead?”

“No, no – no, no, my dear Miss Gartram. It is only what I have always feared, but he would not be advised. Look, my child, look!”

He went quickly to Gartram’s side, and drew something from his breast-pocket and held it before Claude in the light.

“Yes, I know,” she said, “the medicine bottle – the sedative draught.”

“Yes,” said Asher, quietly. “You saw that he had it in his breast.”

“It is generally in that cabinet. He keeps it there.”

“Yes,” said the doctor; “but I found it in his breast-pocket as I was trying to place him in an easier position. What can a medical man do when his patient acts in direct opposition to his wishes?”

“I don’t understand you – that is the medicine you prescribed for him.”

“Yes, my child,” said the doctor, in quick, angry tones; “but if I order a patient to take a tablespoonful of brandy, I don’t mean him to take a bottle.”

“Oh!” ejaculated Claude, the word coming from her breast like a moan.

“You see he had this to take, but he has been in the habit of carrying it in his pocket, to apply to as a drunkard does to a flask. I suspected to-night that he had taken a stronger dose than usual, or at more frequent intervals, and thought that the effect, as he was so inured to it, would pass off, but – ”

“It will, doctor – oh, say it will,” whispered Claude. “Why don’t you give him something? Would wine or spirits be of any good? Ah, here is Doctor Rixton.”

She ran to open the door as steps were heard in the hall, but it was Sarah Woodham who entered, holding her hand to her side, haggard and breathless, as she staggered into the room, only just able to pant forth, “Coming directly,” before she reeled and would have fallen, had not Claude supported her, and let her sink into a chair.

“Hold up, woman!” whispered the doctor, savagely; “you must not give way.”

“I – ran – there – and – back – Miss Claude,” whispered the woman, and then to herself, as she lay back with her eyes closed, “It is too horrible, too horrible!”

The doctor went to the table and poured out some brandy, as Claude crept with a glass of wine to her father’s side, knelt by him, and, taking his hand, laid her other across her breast.

A chill crept through her, and a hysterical sob struggled to her lips, as she felt that the hand she held was growing clammy. But making an effort, she told herself that, in cases of sudden illness, the extremities did grow cold, and that this was not a matter for alarm. There was the doctor’s assurance, too.

Just then she turned her head and saw Sarah Woodham thrusting back the glass the doctor had held to her lips.

“No, no,” she said with a shudder; and the doctor turned away impatiently and set the glass upon the table.

“Miserable teetotal whims,” he muttered; and he went back to Gartram’s side, ignoring Claude’s presence and inquiring looks as he bent over his patient for a moment, and then hurriedly crossed to the door, flung it open, and went out into the hall, and then to the front door, which he threw open, and stood out in the air wiping the perspiration from his brow.

“He ought to be here by now,” he muttered, “he ought to be here by now.”

“Sarah! Sarah!”

The wretched woman opened her eyes with a start, and gazed in a frightened way at her mistress, who was standing over her, and had shaken her shoulder.

“Tell me – you were here?”

“No, my dear. He sent me to lie down in the dining-room to wait till he called me, but I did not go to sleep. I was sitting there – in the dark – thinking, when he came to me and said, ‘I want more help. Your master is worse.’”

“Oh, Sarah, Sarah!” moaned Claude, clinging to her; “tell me it is not so bad as I think. He will not die?”

The woman shuddered as she rose to her feet, and, in a curiously furtive weird way, she crossed to where Gartram lay back in his chair. Pausing once and shrinking away, but evidently overcome by the attraction, she once more advanced, battling the while with that which mastered her, and which drew her unwillingly on, till she stood close to the great easy-chair, and bent down over the form thereon.

Then, drawing herself up to her full height, she stood there erect, gazing straight before her into space, and muttering strangely to herself.

Claude gazed at her in alarm.

“Sarah,” she whispered, “Sarah! why don’t you speak? Sarah!”

There was no reply, and at last Claude laid her hand upon the woman’s arm, with the result that she turned slowly, muttering to herself the while, in a curiously absent manner, as if all the while unconscious of her mistress’s presence.

“Sarah,” whispered Claude again, as she gazed in affright at the woman’s strange, drawn face, “speak to me! I want comfort – tell me – he is not dead?”

“And I tried so hard,” said the woman, hoarsely. “I tried to do that which was right and just. – With all his sins upon his head, unrepentant, harsh and cruel to the last.”

“Sarah!”

“Hush, my child, hush!” said the woman in a low voice, full of deep passionate emotion. “I never had a child to love – to call me mother. Oh, my poor dear, helpless, motherless, fatherless girl; and I tried so hard – I tried so hard.”

“Sarah,” cried Claude, struggling from the woman’s encircling arm, “you don’t think – ”

“This way, please – quick, sir, quick.”

The door was thrown open, and Doctor Asher entered, followed by a tall grave-looking man, who bowed to Claude, and laid his hat upon the table, looking then inquiringly at Asher.

“Yes; of course,” said the doctor. “My dear Miss Gartram, you will go now.”

“But, doctor – ”

“No appeal, please; we must consult over the case and be alone. Trust me; we will do our best. There, you will come back soon.”

Claude reluctantly allowed herself to be led out of the room, and then, as she stood in the great sombre-looking hall; she in turn staggered and would have fallen, but for Sarah Woodham’s arm, and she suffered herself to be led into the drawing-room, where, with the awful truth beginning to grow and grow till it overshadowed her like a cloud she was about to fling herself sobbing in a chair, when a low sigh caught her ear.

Looking up, it was to see Mary Dillon coming slowly into the room, her eyes closed, and feeling her way along by the door, and then supporting herself by the various pieces of furniture she passed.

“Mary!” cried Claude.

“Yes; I have been there – in there all the time. You did not see me, but I heard everything. Oh, Claude, is it all true?”

She did not wait for a response, but sank down, covering her face with her hands, and completely prostrated by her grief.

“No, no,” whispered Claude, going to her, kneeling by her side, and, hungering for love and sympathy, drawing the weeping girl to her breast. “Doctor Asher said that it was not so, Mary darling,” she whispered; “help me to pray. He must not – he cannot die.”

Sarah Woodham stood near them hearing every word, and a shiver swiftly ran through her as she listened to the allusions to death, and again and again, with her face working, she stretched out her hands as if to try and comfort the two weeping girls, but only to shake her head sadly, and draw back from where they were now clasped in each other’s arms.

And the time went on.

Every few moments Claude rose to go to the door, and after opening it, stood listening intently, but the most she could hear was the low muffled sound of voices, and each time she returned to her cousin’s side with a despairing sigh.

“We seem so helpless,” she exclaimed. “Surely I might go back now.” But she made no attempt to disobey the doctor’s commands, and waited and waited till the low sobbing gave place to silent despair; and with eyes fixed upon the door, all sat waiting for the tidings that they dared not hope now would be good.

A step at last in the hall, and Claude flew to the drawing-room door, and flung it open, but only to shrink away, as she saw that it was not Asher, but the strange doctor – a new comer to the place – and one whom they had hardly spoken to before.

He came slowly across the hall, and bowed his head gravely as he entered, looking from one to the other, as if waiting to be interrogated, but no one spoke; and as the door swung to, the light of another day came stealing though the windows, and between the half-drawn blinds in a curious ghastly way, making everything look unreal, and the candles lit upon the table burn with a sickly glare.

Claude made an effort to speak twice, but the words failed upon her lips. She felt that she must rush by this strange, solemn-looking man, and seek the information she wanted in her father’s room, but her limbs refused to act, and she stood holding on by the back of a chair, while the new doctor now fixed his eyes on Sarah Woodham, who stood there wild-looking and motionless, her eyes appearing to burn.

“I grieve to say,” said the new doctor at last, and then he turned, for the woman’s eyes glared at him so fiercely that he ceased, paralysed.

“Well,” she said harshly, “Why do you not speak?”

“Doctor Asher has given me a history of the case,” he said, with an effort. “It is a most regretful incident. No one to blame. Perhaps Doctor Asher might have – but no – I should probably, under the circumstances, have been guilty of the same error.”

He paused in his low, faltering delivery, for Sarah Woodham had taken a step toward him, bending forward, and fascinating him with her wild, dark eyes.

Then, after a painful interval, as a low, querulous wail arose from outside, followed by what sounded like a fiendish chorus of chattering laughter from the rocks below, where a flock of gulls were quarrelling over some refuse cast up by the sea, the doctor continued —

“We have done everything possible under the circumstances, but the case was beyond our power. Ladies, this is a most painful communication for me to have to make. Doctor Asher – completely prostrated by grief. His most prominent patient, and – ”

Claude stretched out one hand blindly fur that of her cousin, and took a step toward the door, but, as they reached it, Mary uttered a low cry and shrank back, withdrawing her hand.

Claude did not notice the action, but went slowly out of the room, as one goes deliberately on when walking in sleep.

They followed her to the door and saw her cross the hall, into which the soft glow of morning was now stealing fast, and there was something weird and strange about her movements as she went on and slowly opened the study door, to pass from their sight, as it were, from day into night.

One moment, the morning light bathed her light dress and gave her a look that was mistily transparent; the next, as she passed through the doorway into the shuttered and curtained room, the glow from the lamp within made her black and strange.

Then the door swung to behind her as she walked silently over the thick carpet.

“Miss Gartram! You have come?”

Claude made no reply, but walked straight to the couch upon which her father had been laid, and there she stood mentally stunned and unable to realise the fact.

His face looked stern and hard, but no more stern and hard than she had often seen it when she had stolen into the room where he had been lying asleep – as he appeared to be lying now – after some tiresome, wakeful night. Everything was the same, even to the faint odour of drugs and spirits which pervaded the place.

For one instant a flash of hope illumined her dark heart, but it was only for a moment. No: he would wake no more. The end had come; and as the truth forced itself deep down into her heart, she sank slowly upon her knees, placed her hands gently round the stalwart figure, and laying her cheek against the stony face, she whispered softly —

“Father, father! I loved you very dearly. Left – left alone!”