"Oh yes--a doctor--I believe I was told of him. It is a strange place
for him to settle in."
"It is a convenient centre for a practice, they say. But he does not
confine his studies to medicine, it seems. He investigates theology
and metaphysics and all sorts of subjects."
"What is his name?"
"Fitzpiers. He represents a very old family, I believe, the
Fitzpierses of Buckbury-Fitzpiers--not a great many miles from here."
"I am not sufficiently local to know the history of the family. I was
never in the county till my husband brought me here." Mrs. Charmond did
not care to pursue this line of investigation. Whatever mysterious
merit might attach to family antiquity, it was one which, though she
herself could claim it, her adaptable, wandering weltburgerliche nature
had grown tired of caring about--a peculiarity that made her a contrast
to her neighbors. "It is of rather more importance to know what the
man is himself than what his family is," she said, "if he is going to
practise upon us as a surgeon. Have you seen him?"
Grace had not. "I think he is not a very old man," she added.
"Has he a wife?"
"I am not aware that he has."
"Well, I hope he will be useful here. I must get to know him when I
come back. It will be very convenient to have a medical man--if he is
clever--in one's own parish. I get dreadfully nervous sometimes,
living in such an outlandish place; and Sherton is so far to send to.
No doubt you feel Hintock to be a great change after watering-place
life."
"I do. But it is home. It has its advantages and its disadvantages."
Grace was thinking less of the solitude than of the attendant
circumstances.
They chatted on for some time, Grace being set quite at her ease by her
entertainer. Mrs. Charmond was far too well-practised a woman not to
know that to show a marked patronage to a sensitive young girl who
would probably be very quick to discern it, was to demolish her dignity
rather than to establish it in that young girl's eyes. So, being
violently possessed with her idea of making use of this gentle
acquaintance, ready and waiting at her own door, she took great pains
to win her confidence at starting.
Just before Grace's departure the two chanced to pause before a mirror
which reflected their faces in immediate juxtaposition, so as to bring
into prominence their resemblances and their contrasts. Both looked
attractive as glassed back by the faithful reflector; but Grace's
countenance had the effect of making Mrs. Charmond appear more than her
full age. There are complexions which set off each other to great
advantage, and there are those which antagonize, the one killing or
damaging its neighbor unmercifully. This was unhappily the case here.
Mrs. Charmond fell into a meditation, and replied abstractedly to a
cursory remark of her companion's. However, she parted from her young
friend in the kindliest tones, promising to send and let her know as
soon as her mind was made up on the arrangement she had suggested.