The Way Home by Henry Handel Richardson Page A

out; though, in order to breathe, you had to leave the windows wide open to mist and fog -- his thoughts were anything but cheerful. There was not work enough for two -- or money either. As it was, he was having to depend more than he cared for on his Australian dividends.
    It was at this juncture that the report reached his ears of illness at "Toplands," where the younger son lay prostrate with gastric fever. But his services were not requisitioned.
    Then came that morning when Mary, grave and worried, broke the news to him that Robinson's gig had been seen at the gates of "Toplands"; the morning when, unable to hire a horse for his rounds, he was tormented, as he trudged the country lanes, by the idea that, like the last, this practice also was threatening to peter out.
    Late that evening as he sat reading, there came a loud rat-tatting at the front door. The doctor in him pricked up his ears at the now unfamiliar sound: it was like an old-time call to action -- in the land of cruel accident and sudden death. The visitor admitted, an excited voice was heard in the passage, and Mary's in reply; after which Mary herself entered the surgery, shutting the door behind her and looking irresolute and uncomfortable. The elder of the two Challoner boys had, it seemed, come driving down post-haste from "Toplands." His brother lay dying. Would Dr. Mahony come back with him -- the dogcart was at the door -- and meet Mr. Robinson?
    "Meet Robinson? Not if I know it!"
    "I told him I couldn't be sure. But, Richard, there's nobody else -- unless he rides all the way to Brixeter. And there and back would take him at least four hours. His brother might be dead by then. Their mother is almost out of her mind, poor thing."
    "Poor thing, indeed! After the way she's treated us. But you haven't a scrap of pride in you."
    "Not when it's a case of life or death I haven't. Dear, don't you think you could manage to overlook what's happened? . . . not stand on etiquette? If the boy should die, you'd reproach yourself bitterly for not having gone."
    "You never will understand these things, Mary! -- and though you live to be a hundred. Little did I dream," he said with violence, as he slapped his book to and ungraciously rose to his feet, "when I settled here, that I should ever come down to playing second fiddle in this fashion."
    "It may be your chance to play first again -- if you cure him."
    Mahony pshawed.
    Off he drove though, as she had known all along he would; and did not get back till four in the morning. Then, half a glance was enough to show her that he was in a state of extreme nervous exasperation. So she asked only a single question: did the lad still live? But Richard could not contain himself; and as he moved about the bedroom, winding up his watch and letting his collar fly, he burst out: "Nothing on earth will induce me to stop in this place, Mary, to be insulted as I have been to-night! This is worse -- a hundred times worse! -- than the colony."
    From under her lashes Mary shot him a swift look he did not see: a look full of motherly tenderness -- and yet triumphant. Aloud she merely said: "But think what a feather in your cap it will be, if the boy recovers, . . . the prestige you will gain."
    "Prestige? Pah! Robinson will say he did the curing, and I stepped in and took the credit. A fat lot of prestige to be got from that! Mary, there's been a dead set made against me here -- I've felt it now for some time, though why, I knew no more than Adam. To-night I believe I got a clue. It's Australia if you please! -- the fact of my having practised in Australia is against me." And at Mary's vigorously expressed disbelief: "Well! just listen to this, my dear, and judge for yourself. First of all, they prefer Robinson fuddled, to me sober. Yes, it's the truth. When I get to 'Toplands' I find him tight -- stupidly tight -- standing by the bed staring like an owl. Quite devoid of shame he evidently is not though, for no sooner did he see me