"Cherry Wilder - Dr. Tilmann's Consultant, A Scientific Romance" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wilder Cherry)

Dr. Tilmann's Consultant: A Scientific Romance
Cherry Wilder

Above the grove of pines there was one lone chalet where Dr. Tilmann sometimes lodged a special patient. During the summer of 1913, when Rosalind accompanied the Ostrov family to Bavaria for the second time, there was a young woman in the Annex. An Englishwoman, declared Marie-Louise Ostrova excitedly; exquisitely beautiful and mad as a bird. She could sometimes be heard in the night, playing the harmonium. Rosalind expressed mild disapproval of this gossip, as a Governess should. Marie-Louise had made friends with a little nurse who spoke French. Rosalind did not believe that this was at all the place for a lively child of thirteen but the trials of the Ostrov family were such that there seemed to be no help for it.

St. Verena's Hospital specialized in nervous complaints of the European aristocracy; Dr. Lucas Tilmann had recently taken over from his father, Professor Dr. Wilhelm Tilmann. The old man still wore a frock coat, a cravat, and the kind of high stiff collar called in German a Vatermorder, a father-murderer. Many of the gentlemen about at the time did so, too, but the Junior Chief, Dr. Lucas, was a dress reformer who went about in a soft collar and a lightweight jacket of beige linen.

The Ostrov family came ostensibly for the Countess Valeria's nerves but really it was for poor Leonid, the only son, who was losing his reason. Besides being unfortunate, charming, cultivated, and in decline, the family were so astonishingly rich that they had retained an important French specialist at the estate on the Black Sea for the winter. On Christmas Eve, the anniversary of the General's death, Leonid made another attempt, this time from his balcony, and poor Dr. Patin restrained him at the cost of a broken arm. Rosalind dared not reveal much of what she experienced during these years to her widowed mother in Cheltenham.

One evening, after a long day with the Countess during her hydrotherapy Rosalind followed a path up into the pines to her own favorite retreat. It was a clearing in the wood with a rustic bench and a wayside shrine which contained not a carved wooden saint but an icon of St. George, painted on metal. Many Russian families patronized St.Verenas; they valued its discretion as well as its natural beauty. Rosalind could sit on the bench and look out to the ranks of the mountains or down to the village. Overhead the Annex was visible among the trees and an even higher mountain meadow, bathed in bright sunlight.

There was a rustling in the bushes: she thought of a pair of marmots or even a deer. In fact it was a young woman, of about Rosalind's own age, dressed in a gray silk dress of "reformed" cut. Her poor stockinged feet were stained and hurt, her golden hair stood out round her pale face in a cloud and hung in long, ragged elf locks down past her hips; leaves and pine needles had caught in it.

Rosalind understood the situation at once. She rose up, took the patient's arm, and said: "Let me help you!"

"You are English!" whispered the girl. "Oh please. . ."

"Sit here with me," said Rosalind. "Let me brush your poor hair."

She had a large bag of toilet articles which she had carried with her from the bathhouse: the girl turned her head obediently and Rosalind went to work with professional skill.

"You have an English touch," said the girl. "My body is covered from head to foot with the imprint of his fingers."

"Hush," said Rosalind gently.

"He comes to me at night," continued the girl. "All the poor Doctor's beastly medicines can't make me sleep. I wake up, very hot and wet under the horrid German feather bed and there is Teddy, my darling Teddy..."

Rosalind began to plait the magnificent fall of golden hair into a loose braid. She turned her head and saw Dr. Lucas Tilmann emerge from the bushes warily, as if stalking a butterfly. The mad girl had not seen him but her mood had altered; she began to weep, pouring out a stream of confused regrets and sorrows. She would never be well, she was imprisoned, the wretched little harmonium was out of tune, her mother was cruel, the swans had all flown away from the lake ....Teddy knew what she should do and she had tried, more than once, but it was too difficult, the guns hurt her fingers.

"Oh no, " said Rosalind softly, "you must never do that. Never try to hurt yourself."

She fastened the enormous Rapunzel braid of hair with a pink ribbon from her bag. Dr. Tilmann drew closer and said cautiously: "Miss Courtney...Maud?"

The patient screamed aloud; before she could spring up Rosalind put her arms around her firmly.

"No," she said. "Please, Maud dear. Please be good! Dr. Tilmann will give you a nice cup of tea...see, he has brought your slippers. How kind...."

A nurse appeared now on the path from the Annex and a young intern, Dr. Daniel, alerted by telephone, came running up from the hospital. Maud Courtney was docile again; her slippers were put on, she was led away down the hill to the main building. Lucas Tilmann accompanied the party a little way then rejoined Rosalind in the clearing.

"Miss--Lane? I am deeply indebted...."

"Poor thing," said Rosalind. "I hope that she...."

He sat down beside her on the bench and covered his face with his hands.

"The prognosis," he said, after a few seconds, "is not good."

"She spoke of someone called Teddy..." prompted Rosalind.

"Her brother died in the Punjab," sighed Dr. Tilmann. "She has never been told."