Here were deeper reasons than the superficial talk of a new man, which
appeared still flimsier in the drawing-room over the shop, when they
were recited to Mrs. Mawmsey, a woman accustomed to be made much of as
a fertile mother,--generally under attendance more or less frequent
from Mr. Gambit, and occasionally having attacks which required Dr.
Minchin.
"Does this Mr. Lydgate mean to say there is no use in taking medicine?"
said Mrs. Mawmsey, who was slightly given to drawling. "I should like
him to tell me how I could bear up at Fair time, if I didn't take
strengthening medicine for a month beforehand. Think of what I have to
provide for calling customers, my dear!"--here Mrs. Mawmsey turned to
an intimate female friend who sat by--"a large veal pie--a stuffed
fillet--a round of beef--ham, tongue, et cetera, et cetera! But what
keeps me up best is the pink mixture, not the brown. I wonder, Mr.
Mawmsey, with _your_ experience, you could have patience to listen. I
should have told him at once that I knew a little better than that."
"No, no, no," said Mr. Mawmsey; "I was not going to tell him my
opinion. Hear everything and judge for yourself is my motto. But he
didn't know who he was talking to. I was not to be turned on _his_
finger. People often pretend to tell me things, when they might as
well say, 'Mawmsey, you're a fool.' But I smile at it: I humor
everybody's weak place. If physic had done harm to self and family, I
should have found it out by this time."
The next day Mr. Gambit was told that Lydgate went about saying physic
was of no use.
"Indeed!" said he, lifting his eyebrows with cautious surprise. (He
was a stout husky man with a large ring on his fourth finger.) "How
will he cure his patients, then?"
"That is what I say," returned Mrs. Mawmsey, who habitually gave weight
to her speech by loading her pronouns. "Does _he_ suppose that people
will pay him only to come and sit with them and go away again?"
Mrs. Mawmsey had had a great deal of sitting from Mr. Gambit, including
very full accounts of his own habits of body and other affairs; but of
course he knew there was no innuendo in her remark, since his spare
time and personal narrative had never been charged for. So he replied,
humorously--
"Well, Lydgate is a good-looking young fellow, you know."
"Not one that I would employ," said Mrs. Mawmsey. "_Others_ may do as
they please."
Hence Mr. Gambit could go away from the chief grocer's without fear of
rivalry, but not without a sense that Lydgate was one of those
hypocrites who try to discredit others by advertising their own
honesty, and that it might be worth some people's while to show him up.
Mr. Gambit, however, had a satisfactory practice, much pervaded by the
smells of retail trading which suggested the reduction of cash payments
to a balance. And he did not think it worth his while to show Lydgate
up until he knew how. He had not indeed great resources of education,
and had had to work his own way against a good deal of professional
contempt; but he made none the worse accoucheur for calling the
breathing apparatus "longs."