Doctor Luttrell's First PatientCarey, Rosa Nouchette
General
Doctor Luttrell's First Patient
Carey, Rosa Nouchette
Fiction; Love stories
They found Alwyn pacing the room restlessly. He stopped and looked
relieved as Greta entered.
"I was afraid you had gone," he said, abruptly. "Do you know you
passed me in the street this morning? You had that thing on"--touching
her sealskin mantle--"but you were not looking at me. I thought it was
a ghost, and then I tried to follow you, but some vehicles got in my
way, and then you disappeared."
"I wish I had seen you," she said, softly. And then Alwyn resumed his
restless walk.
It was with difficulty that Olivia could induce him to come to the
table, and then he could not eat; his eyes looked feverishly bright,
and his cough made Greta glance at him anxiously.
When tea was over Olivia left the room for a little. Alwyn had utterly
refused to go to bed until he had seen Dr. Luttrell; he was evidently
tormented by remorse for his hardness to his father, and Olivia thought
that he might unburden himself more freely to his old friend; and she
was right. On her return she found them talking together, and the
strained, hunted look had left Alwyn's eyes.
Greta's were swollen with weeping, but there was a smile on her lips.
"Alwyn has been telling me his troubles," she said, simply, "and I
could not help crying over them, he has suffered so, and I felt so
sorry for him. If only we had not gone abroad! But when we came back
the Grange was empty, and no one knew what had become of Alwyn. He had
quarrelled with his father, and it was supposed he had enlisted and
gone to India; and he had talked so often of doing this that I thought
it was probably the truth. Now I must go, but I shall come again
to-morrow." And then she smiled at him and rose from her seat.
"He has talked it all out and it has done him good," she observed, as
she and Olivia lingered a moment in the passage; "but if his father
dies, Alwyn will never get over it.
"Oh, he is much to blame," she went on; "he has been very wild, very
imprudent, utterly mad and reckless; but his poor father was to blame,
too. A high-spirited lad like Alwyn would not be kept in
leading-strings. Mr. Gaythorne was far too strict with him--his own
mother said so--and yet in his way he loved him. How often poor Olive
would cry about it to me.
"Dear, dear Olive, how I loved her! And I was very fond of Mrs.
Gaythorne, too, she was so sweet and motherly; she always called us her
big and her little daughter. I was so much taller than Olive; but
there"--interrupting herself--"if I begin talking about the old days at
the Grange I shall never finish."
"But you will come to-morrow?"
"Yes; indeed, how could I keep away? Do you know that for years Alwyn
and I were just like brother and sister--I don't believe he cared much
more for Olive than he did for me. I think I understood him better
than she did--his mother always said so. Well, good-night, dear Mrs.
Luttrell; I shall come to-morrow as early as I can."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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