Chapter XI. The Warning of Guinevere.

With varying chances and hourly fluctuations, the little life at Maconville floated on the undulating wave of diphtheria, now rising with the swelling tide, now ebbing far away from the shore.

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Five days had passed since the doctor had inserted the silver tube, and the breathing was still clear. He had telegrams from Guinevere three times a day, and frequently saw her husband in Augusta. No sign of the encroachment of the membrane below the tube, and Dr. Seymour reported that it had disappeared from the tonsils and the back of the throat. The ardent hopes of Guinevere reached the perihelion¹ of their mental horizon, when, now that nearly a week had passed, there was no return of the laborious respiration and the deadly struggles of the child, and Eugene rode out to remove the tube.

"He breathes entirely through the tube," she said; "how can he breathe if you take it away?"

"I'll put my finger over the opening first and find out if he can," said Eugene: "if he can't I'll put it back." He took the tube out of the artificial opening in the neck, and placed his finger to occlude the orifice, but the mouth gaped and the face grew livid again.

"Put it back; for God's sake put it back," she cried, "before he dies." He took his finger off, and the air entered the opening in gusts; then, after a few spasmodic catches at breath, the little nostrils opened, the blue lips whitened and closed, and Cyril breathed as well as ever he did in his life.

"There's no diphtheria there now," he said, "and in a few days that artificial orifice will fill in itself, and he will breathe as naturally as he did before."

"Thank God, thank God," she stooped over Cyril and cried; "My darling, my darling, thank God."

Not one of that very peculiar household rejoiced at the exultation of Guinevere more than the rough big heart of the old coal-miner himself.

"There wasn't any of they whistle things at the school I went to, dochther," he said, putting the big quart bottle again upon the table and pushing it over to Whitworth. "Help yoursel', I suppose you've no broken your own breath this morning with a taste. I've just been down at the skips telling the men, and I'm as pleased as if they struck another seam to see that little chap all right again. Did ye see anything of Birdie this week down your way?"

Eugene replied that he had seen her twice. "Will ye tell her the next time that she had better come home?" said the old man, "instead of gadding about the country's side and spending half her time with that old soft blundering booby and snivelling Mag, and flying about to balls and parties everywhere; tell her I said so, and that will do for her."

"I'll explain to her," said Eugene, "that there is no fear of any infection when you burn some sulphur² on the fire-shovel in that room, and that you want her to go home to-morrow. So good-bye, and don't forget to burn it for three hours in all the rooms; leave everything in the room as it stands."

"I'll put the old woman up to it," he replied, and the doctor galloped rejoicing away.

Close by where the first interview between Marvel and the doctor took page 63place, stood a nice villa ornée³ with large grounds, and a nice garden in front and at the sides of an encircling verandah. In the cold and stormy winter it looked bare; but in the spring-time and summer the golden lilies and Parma violets gave it a choice and elegant appearance, while the lavender growth of the wistaria and the trailing climbers on its trellised verandah added quite a grace and rustic charm to the view. Fond of quietude, it was a haven well suited to the tastes of Guinevere, and her husband took a lease of it for twelve months. There, on the first opportunity, she took the now convalescent Cyril, and a girl leaving the hospital was engaged as a general servant. Her husband was away in his town office for the greater part of the day, and Guinevere had little else to occupy her time besides strolling about the gardens in the reserve with her little boy. She often met Eugene, and on several occasions she saw him meet Marvel there, in a way that made her suspect that the meeting had been pre-arranged. With the lightning foresight and intuition of her nature, she imagined that he was losing himself in the charms, the ostentation, and the guiles of the paradisal Marvel. Always fond of him and always esteeming him ever since the days when he had revised her classical verses on the seats by the orange and pomegranate trees of the university, till the evening she had danced his first dance with him in the lancers at the garrison hall, and sylph-like she had moved to the chorus waltz of "II n'y a que toi," she now loved and regarded him as her noblest friend with all her heart and soul.

"Who saved my child's life?" she would say to herself: "Eugene and only Eugene. How can I repay him for that, even if I never heard of him before."

Turning the immediate circumstances over in her mind, dwelling upon the present outlook of events and the remarkable frequency of the meetings and the trysts of her two friends in the park, and instinctively feeling a sense of something wrong about to happen, she argued the case out in her own mind and decided upon speaking to her husband. The girl-mother, from whose lips no unkind word was ever known to escape, and on whose brow a frown was never seen, her deeper feelings stirred by the respect which she felt for Whitworth, on the return of Marmaduke one evening from his office approached him in a semi-apologetic way and said—"Do you know, Marmaduke, I believe that Dr. Whitworth is going to make a mistake for once in his life, and he may regret it for ever. I have seen him, time after time, in the park meet Marvel and stroll lovingly with her about among the flowers, and sit listening to her captivating voice for hours on that red seat over there by the lake. You know what a vain, frivolous and bad-tempered girl Marvel is, and he would never have a minute's peace if he was married to her."

"She is a very captious and capricious girl, I know," he replied; "but he knows his own business best, I presume; besides, she is the old man's pet, you know, Guinevere, and that old man may cut up pretty big some day, you know."

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"Do I know?" she said with a touch of indignation; "he is not the man to make a fortune-hunter; but he is soft-hearted and is beguiled by that old auntie and her pretty niece, as she calls her. He will make a mistake as sure as his name is Eugene, and considering what he has done for us I think it only right that I should go out of my way for once and warn him of the danger to-morrow. I shall never forgive myself if I don't, and I feel sure what the end will be if I don't. I know he won't mind my speaking to him about it; he made my little pet better, didn't he, darling, and you say your prayers for poor doctor every night, don't you dear?" while Cyril, sitting on her knee, nodded his assent and approved of his mother's idea.

"Better for you to mind your own business," said Marmaduke.

"I intend making that my own business," she returned, "because I think it is incumbent on me to do so; we will go up to see the good doctor, to-morrow, won't we dear?" tossing Cyril in her arms, "and naughty papa can stay at home."

Eugene never carried the full purport of her father's message to Marvel—he merely told her there was no danger of infection in the house.

Many and frequent were the meetings mentioned by Guinevere to her husband; but many and frequent were the meetings in the green moonlit park and the little house at Sunnyside she knew nothing about at all. Well-known residents passing them together in the gardens, the relations between Eugene and Marvel were soon bruited about the town, and no sooner had full and reliable reports been lodged at the head office of the "Evening Star" than elaborate accounts were distributed throughout its wide circulation.

Sometimes neglecting or procrastinating his duties in the hospital, he expended the whole afternoon frittering away his time on the lake with Marvel, the white swans and the paradise ducks, and his money on the little oval table at Sunnyside. His whole thoughts and homage were sacrificed before the shrine of his love for Marvel. If the millstone of the university had counterbalanced his regard for Guinevere when he inscribed that tender verse upon her book, the hospital stood in the light of his love not at all. Quick in decision and action, he would treat numbers of out-patients, go the rounds of the wards, perform grave and capital operations, with the voice of Marvel echoing like that of the Greek echoing goddess in his ears, and surrender the rest of his time to her whims, frivolities and fancies.

The old duenna, now that her ozœna⁴ was a thing of the past, would venture out for a promenade through the park at the very hour his inamorata⁵ would guess him to be there. There, in slow and dignified dawdling steps, she would accost and walk with him, pouring the love-poison into his heart, sweetened and flavoured by her artifices alone. To extol Marvel to the seventh heaven; to aggrandise and upheave her in his imagination; to supplement any of Marvel's own craftiness, and to secure him as Marvel's own for ever, was her constant aim and the goal of her page 65ambition. With studied and attuned cadences, and the inevitable stoppages for breath, "My niece is always so excited," she would say, "and agitated when she knows you are coming (long breath), and after you are gone she wants to sit on the (long breath) same chair, and sometimes I have heard her when asleep calling out 'Eugene, Eugene.' She (long breath) loves the very ground beneath your feet, and her whole heart is in your grasp if (long breath) you only ask her for it. She is made for you, and you for her (long breath), and no sweeter bride ever walked to the altar than would (long breath) my Bird of Paradise, my bright birdie Marvel. Other girls may cover you with their (long breath) blandishments of love and their specious and knavish hypocrisy (long breath). Not so my sweet innocent Marvel." In spite of the asthma, the repugnant old lady busied herself by day and by night spreading her nets for him whithersoever he wandered; albeit Marvel was the fons et origo⁶ of all her schemes. Nolens volens⁷ she was determined to capture him; but with her sickening vapidities she was defeating her own ends, while her hopes were rising with the leap of a kangaroo because he affected to listen to all her flattering encomiums⁸.

Dreamland and fairyland all seemed to be to Eugene, and though gladly he would receive the treasure that was so benignly proffered him the officious exertions of the old auntie seemed to be out of place, and he took little notice of her avowals. Like the elephant when captured herself, helping to captivate others, an artful professional matchmaker he thought her, but cunning, deceitful, and overdoing the part which she took upon herself to play. Little notice of anything indeed did he take, and what work he did he did as if it were some aggravating task and the sooner it was done and he was off to meet Marvel the better.

Wending her weary way on Sunday morning, and foregoing her usual attendance at the church, came what appeared to Whitworth another deputation—an antagonistic deputation concerning the mighty question at issue. It consisted of none other than Cyril and the pale Guinevere. Attired in olive-green silk, and wearing a coarse fancy straw picture hat with white bows, and with the hand of Cyril in her own, she directed her steps up the steep hospital hill and met him in the garden.

"Good morning, Cyril," said Eugene, picking up the child in his arms; "is anything the matter?" turning to Guinevere.

"How is Marvel?" she said, smiling.

"Marvel!" said the doctor. "Am I Marvel's keeper?"

"Not yet perhaps," she rejoined; "but everybody thinks you soon will be."

"Marvel is too superb for me," he said; "she's not within my pale."⁹

"Oh! of course, as usual, you are going to under-estimate yourself. Now, if I hadn't known you so long, and if Marmaduke and I did not know yon saved Cyril's life, I wouldn't say anything; I was her only friend at school, and I have always been fond of her as a very bright and attractive girl; but if you are going to marry her you will rue it for ever. page 66You don't know her as I do; there is worse below than comes to the surface, and so soon as the first gilt of her married life wears off, she will appear in her true colours; what you see now is all bright and glossy tints, what you would be chained to afterwards is irrevocable wormwood and gall. No girl is more attractive and engaging when she likes; no girl is more bitterly revengeful or more maliciously fickle. I have come purposely to warn you to beware of the shoals, for beneath a seemingly affectionate surface is engendered cantankerous passion, hatred and venom. Cross her, or show her the most trifling neglect, and your lovable Marvel will be your deadliest enemy; your cup of joy will be changed into a caldron of misery. Fickle, vain, wayward, captious and exacting, spoilt by her father at home, petted and pampered by all her relations, fawned upon and flattered by her friends—she would never be satisfied if you laid down your life for her. The merest surmise will call out all her rankest and fiercest jealousies, and the giddiest fancy her false and treacherous traits. Instead of helping you, she will drag you down; instead of comforting you, she will be a thorn in your side. Marry Marvel Gould and you will writhe in unending torture."

The fairy of cross purposes touched his face with her magic wand. Listening to every word and noticing her eyes fill, the deeps of Eugene's emotion were moved, and telling her he never was more surprised in his life than he was to hear Guinevere speak unkindly of anybody, "I know it's very kind of you Guinevere," he said, with eyes downcast to the ground, "to show so true an interest in me; but few can see through other people's spectacles, and if the prospect is to be so dismal as you imagine, it may be my own fault for provoking these passions of which you speak. Marvel seems to me to be a treasure that would grace many a better home than I could offer her, and if I thought she had a true regard for me I would not regret it, even if I had every reason for regret. What is done cannot easily be undone: Euripides said it could not be undone at all. The man who regrets that he married a woman when his eyes were wide open is no better than a coward and a fraud. But come in and see my new abode; our mutual friend was here with her aunt, and I showed them through the house." She was just about to walk up the stone steps, when Lilliecrap appeared at the dividing fence.

"One of the patients is dying," he said, "the cook from Madame's; she is in the ward with him herself, and asked for you." Guinevere walked away, telling him if he had any time to spare to call that evening, and see Marmaduke at their home. He never called. Again his headstrong will and discourteous neglect whirled him out of his worldly senses like wild horses, and led him into paths of treachery, deceit and danger.

"He won't die, that man," he said to the wardsman, "he'll be up in a week, I gave him half a grain of morphia; bring in the atropine and I'll inject a little. Smack his face with a wet towel and give him strong black coffee, he only wants rousing a little. How do you do Madame?"

The greeting of the socially-experienced lady was cold and stiff; few and page 67pointed her words. "Not thinking you were at home Dr. Whitworth as I was more inclined to suspect you were at dinner somewhere needless for me to mention I came into the ward with Mr. Lilliecrap but if you happen to have this afternoon I shall be glad of your company home to dinner with me as you think the butler will recover so soon."

Smelling another deputation in the air, and drawing his inferences from Madame's previous remarks, he explained with the greatest complaisance that it would not look well if he left the hospital under the circumstances, and if Madame could be so gracious as to excuse him, he would prefer to remain, and call upon her during the week. He never called upon her then, or ever after in his life.

Jubilant over his promise to call, he walked with her as far as the front gate, where they met Guinevere coming down the hill; when, upon his doing the honours of a mutual introduction, the noble mien of Guinevere contrasted signally with the elaborate demeanour of Madame. Walking along together, as their homes lay in the same direction, the mansion of Madame lying about half-a-mile from the gardens, the merits and the demerits of the new resident surgeon were discussed as a matter of course by the two ladies. In the one, the still untold platonic love tinged the conversation; in the other, the second-hand jealousy of Madame at the name of Whitworth being so often blended with that of Marvel. She had not forgotten her ineffectual attempts to bring about a rapprochement between him and her protegée, Carrie. The gate-spring well oiled and the long handled umbrella emphasising her volumes like a baton and according with the motions of the pendulating head, the minute physiognomy of Marvel's face, her idiosyncrasies and everything anybody had ever reported she had ever said or done, were thoroughly ventilated with as much detraction from her character as she could decently intersperse, and drummed into the absorbent ears of Guinevere.

"Can you explain to me my dear Mrs. Payne," said Madame, "how it is she gets that feathery name?"

"What feathery name?" said Guinevere, quite interested.

"Have you really and truly never heard her called the Bird of Paradise?" she stood and asked. "Her aunt says she had that name ever since she wore long dresses but for the life of me I can never see nor imagine how it can be an appropriate name unless it is that she is so often seen in peacock plumes and needless to mention and not forgetting that fine feathers make fine birds my dear Mrs. Payne my beauteous companion Carrie might be called the bird of Heaven itself." Madame did not know that Marvel was entitled to that name too.

"Bird—of—Paradise," repeated Guinevere; "that is an ornithological name; but the peacock is not the bird of Paradise. They belong to two different and disconnected families in natural history. The term 'bird of Paradise' comprises a family of birds known by ornithologists as the Paradiseidæ, found chiefly in New Guinea and the islands of the New Guinea group, and remarkable for the page 68splendour of their plumage. In all other respects they are related to the crow family, the corvidæ, and to them they exhibit a strong similarity in their habits, general form and voice. The male birds alone have brilliant plumage, while the females are common and small. They show a singularly beautiful play of tints, and have a glossy and velvety appearance. Long tufts of feathers grow from the shoulders to the wings, and in the great emerald bird of Paradise (Paradisea apoda) these tufts are prolonged even beyond the tail. They are all of exquisite lightness and delicacy. In the genus Lophorina, elongated feathers spring out from the head like wings, and the birds can erect them at pleasure. The common bird of Paradise has a cross-like tail and two long downy feathers extended along the sides. When the monsoons change the birds migrate, and they are always very lively and active, or even pert and bold. They protect their feathers most scrupulously from soiling, and bestow a vast amount of care upon them. They live on the fruit of the teak-tree, figs, and large butterflies, which abound in the New Guinea islands."

"What colour are they?" enquired Madame.

"The common bird of Paradise," she continued, "is about as large as a jay, and is a cinnamon, colour, the upper part of the head and neck yellow, while the throat is emerald green, and there are yellow tufts on the 'shoulders. The 'paradisea rubra' has long feathers of a carmine colour and the birds on an average measure two feet in length."

"How beautiful," sad Madame; "any more?"

"Only about the the numerous fables attaching to the bird of Paradise." she replied, "such as that they spend all their time floating in the air. Their food was supposed to be dew and nectar, obtained from the flowering climbers on trees in the higher regions of the gorgeous sunshine of the tropical forests. Magellan, the great navigator, was a large exporter of their skins, the legs having been cut off by the islanders, in consequence of which they were supposed to be devoid of less. The natives attach quite a sacred character to these birds. They shoot them with arrows, and their skins are employed not only as ornaments but as a charm to shield the soldier in battle. They call them the Manuco-dewata or Birds of God, while in other languages they are known as birds of the air, birds of the sun, and birds of Heaven."

"Oh! my dear Mrs. Payne however did you find out all that? what a wonder you are you must have been to New Guinea," said Madame; "it is just as I say she has no right to such a lovely name and its only because she wears that peacock skirt have you seen any peacocks in New Guinea?"

Replying that she had not been out of the United States in her life, but had known all about birds when she was a student at the university, Guinevere continued—"The peacock, or peafowl, known to ornithologists Phasianidæ; there are only two species, natives of the East Indies. The common: peacock—the pavo cristatus—has a very neat crest or aigrette of fine stiff feathers. The train derives its beauty from loose barbs of its page 69feathers, the great number and the unequal length adding largely to its gorgeous hues, and producing the moon-like spot on its plumage. It is blue in the neck, green and black on the back and wings, and brown, green, violet and gold on the tail."

"So it is," said Madame.

"The play of the metallic tints, in changing lights, increases still further the grand effect. He strives to attract attention, labouring with ostentation and pride as he struts about, to show himself off to advantage."

"That's Marvel all over," said Madame.

"Those are the characteristics that make the name of the peacock proverbial," said Guinevere.

"So they are," said Madame; "I'm sure there's nothing about Carrie"—

"Sometimes in old age the female will assume the bright plumage of the male; some birds are pure white and some are pied. If you look at the Bible, in the book of Chronicles, chapter ix., verse 21, you will see that King Solomon's ships went to Tarshish with the servants of Huram, and every three years they brought to the king gold and silver and ivory and apes and peacocks; while Alexander the Great brought them to the Greek empire after his expedition to India, after which, in the days of the Roman empire, royal dishes contained peacocks' tongues and brains. You will find that in the Latin poets."

"I must ask my dear Carrie to look it up in Horace I think that's what she calls the book," said Madame.

"It was only the other day," proceeded Guinevere, that I was reading a description by Colonel Williamson of the Jungleterry forest of Siam. where he found whole woods covered with their gorgeous plumage, to which the setting sun imparted additional brilliancy on the plains where he had seen them feeding upon the mustard bloom in thousands: while their cries at early morning in Ceylon are so tumultuous as to banish sleep and amount to a positive inconvenience. There are only two species, and the other is the Japan or Javanese peacock (Pavo japonicus, javanicus or muticus); but it is smaller and, though similar, is not so brilliant; that species abounds in the South East of Asia, Sumatra, the Malay Peninsula and the neighbouring islands. It is supposed that the harsh cry of the peacock is imitated in the Greek name taos, from which is borrowed the Latin corruption pavo and the English, 'peacock'. I think Cyril is getting tired, so I must say good-bye, Madame."

"Good-bye my dear Mrs. Payne," said Madame. "You are a treat I have enjoyed this morning's walk and when I see Miss Marvel's auntie I shall confound her with my knowledge of birds of Paradise and peacocks. Good-bye but just a minute I'm sure they would not believe me if I quoted all the science in the museum but Bird of Paradise or no Bird of Paradise she will never make any man's home a Paradise more likely she will be the serpent crawling within it."

"You mean the serpent of the Garden of Eden," replied Guinevere; page 70"the rose would smell as sweet were she not called the rose," as she opened the gate, and said good-bye to Madame again, promising to write out for her the natural histories of birds of paradise and peacocks, probably with the hope that it would expel from the mind of Madame her Penchant for all the fashionable fiddle-faddle and tarradiddles of the town.