CHAPTER LXVI.
I unfolded my new prospects to Mrs. Ashleigh. She was more easily
reconciled to them than I could have supposed, judging by her habits,
which were naturally indolent, and averse to all that disturbed their even
tenor. But the great grief which had befallen her had roused up that
strength of devotion which lies dormant in all hearts that are capable of
loving another more than self. With her full consent I wrote to Faber,
communicating my intentions, instructing him to purchase the property he
had so commended, and inclosing my banker's order for the amount, on an
Australian firm. I now announced my intention to retire from my
profession; made prompt arrangements with a successor to my practice;
disposed of my two houses at L----; fixed the day of my departure.
Vanity was dead within me, or I might have been gratified by the sensation
which the news of my design created. My faults became at once forgotten;
such good qualities as I might possess were exaggerated. The public
regret vented and consoled itself in a costly testimonial, to which even
the poorest of my patients insisted on the privilege to contribute, graced
with an inscription flattering enough to have served for the epitaph on
some great man's tomb. No one who has served an art and striven for a
name is a stoic to the esteem of others; and sweet indeed would such
honours have been to me had not publicity itself seemed a wrong to the
sanctity of that affliction which set Lilian apart from the movement and
the glories of the world.
The two persons most active in "getting up" this testimonial were,
nominally, Colonel Poyntz--in truth, his wife--and my old disparager, Mr.
Vigors! It is long since my narrative has referred to Mr. Vigors. It is
due to him now to state that, in his capacity of magistrate, and in his
own way, he had been both active and delicate in the inquiries set on foot
for Lilian during the unhappy time in which she had wandered, spellbound,
from her home. He, alone, of all the more influential magnates of the
town, had upheld her innocence against the gossips that aspersed it; and
during the last trying year of my residence at L----, he had sought me,
with frank and manly confessions of his regret for his former prejudice
against me, and assurances of the respect in which he had held me ever
since my marriage--marriage but in rite--with Lilian. He had then, strong
in his ruling passion, besought me to consult his clairvoyants as to her
case. I declined this invitation so as not to affront him,--declined it,
not as I should once have done, but with no word nor look of incredulous
disdain. The fact was, that I had conceived a solemn terror of all
practices and theories out of the beaten track of sense and science.
Perhaps in my refusal I did wrong. I know not. I was afraid of my own
imagination. He continued not less friendly in spite of my refusal. And,
such are the vicissitudes in human feeling, I parted from him whom I had
regarded as my most bigoted foe with a warmer sentiment of kindness than
for any of those on whom I had counted on friendship. He had not deserted
Lilian. It was not so with Mrs. Poyntz. I would have paid tenfold the
value of the testimonial to have erased, from the list of those who
subscribed to it, her husband's name.
The day before I quitted L----, and some weeks after I had, in fact,
renounced my practice, I received an urgent entreaty from Miss Brabazon to
call on her. She wrote in lines so blurred that I could with difficulty
decipher them, that she was very ill, given over by Dr. Jones, who had
been attending her. She implored my opinion.
