"It's quite insulting--after the trouble Richard has put
himself to. If Agnes's case puzzles him, I should like to know who will
understand it better. I think I'll go and see her myself this afternoon.
It can't be HER wish to call in a stranger."
Not till some time after did she remember her own private embarrassment.
And, by then, the incident had taken its proper place in her mind--had
sunk to the level of insignificance to which it belonged.
"Such a piece of nonsense!" was her final verdict. "As if I could worry
Richard with it, when he has so many really important things to occupy
him."
Chapter V
Yes, those were palmy days; the rate at which the practice spread
astonished even himself. No slack seasons for him now; winter saw him as
busy as summer; and his chief ground for complaint was that he was
unable to devote the meticulous attention he would have wished to each
individual case. "It would need the strength of an elephant to do that."
But it was impossible not to feel gratified by the many marks of
confidence he received. And if his work had but left him some leisure
for study and an occasional holiday, he would have been content. But in
these years he was never able to get his neck out of the yoke; and Mary
took her annual jaunts to Melbourne and sea-breezes alone.
In a long talk they had with each other, it was agreed that, except in
an emergency, he was to be chary of entering into fresh engagements--
this referred in the first place to confinements, of which his book was
always full; and secondly, to outlying bush-cases, the journey to and
from which wasted many a precious hour.
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