She changed colour--from fair to flush, from red to white again--and
her hand upon the gold cord trembled. I remembered it afterward,
though I was not conscious of noticing it at the time.
"You need not," she replied, in her low, controlled voice, "on my
account. You need never come again."
"It is easier to come," I answered irritably, "than to know that you
sit here making yourself miserable because I don't."
"Have I ever fretted you about coming, Esmerald? I did not know it."
"It would be easier if you did fret!" I cried crossly. "I'd rather
you'd say a thing than look it. Any man would."
Indeed, it would have been a paltry satisfaction to me just then if I
could have found her to blame. Her blamelessness irritated my
self-complacence as the light irritates defective eyes.
"I am due at the hospital in twenty-two minutes," I went on, excitedly.
"Chirugeon is behaving like Apollyon. If I'm not there to handle him,
nobody will. The whole staff are afraid of him--everybody but me. We
sha'n't get the new ward built these two years if he carries the day
to-night. I've got a consultation at Decker's--the old lady is dying.
It's no sort of use dragging a tired man out there; I can't do her any
good; but they will have it. I'm at the beck and call of every whim.
Isn't that dinner ready? I wish I had time to change my boots! They
are wet through. My head aches horribly. Brake telegraphed me to get
down to Stock Street before two o'clock to save what is left of that
Santa Ma stock. I couldn't go. I had an enormous office--forty
people. I've lost ten thousand dollars in this panic. I've got to see
Brake on my way to Decker's. I lost a patient this morning--that
little girl of the Harrowhart's. She was a poor little scrofulous
thing. But they are terribly cut up about it.... Chowder? I wish
you'd had a good clear soup. I don't feel as if I could touch chowder.
I hope you have some roast beef, better than the last. You mustn't let
Parsnip cheat you. Quail? There's no nourishment in a quail for a man
in my state. The gas leaks. Can't you have it attended to? Hurry up
the coffee. I must swallow it and go. I've got more than ten men
could do."
"It is more than one woman can do"--she began gently, when I came to
the end of this outbreak and my breath together.
"What did you say? Do speak louder!"
"I said it seems to be more than one woman can do, to rest you."
"Yes," I said carelessly, "it is. You can't do the first thing for me,
except to do me the goodness to ring for a decent cup of coffee. I
can't drink this."
"Esmerald"--
"Oh, what? I can't stop to talk. There, I've burned my tongue, now.
If there's anything I can't stand, it is going to a consultation with a
burned tongue."
"How tired you are, Esmerald! I was only going to say that I am sorry.
I can't let you go without saying that."
"I can't see that it helps it any. I am so tired I don't want to be
touched. Never mind my coat. I'll put it on myself. Tell Joe--no. I
left the horse standing. I don't want Joe. I suppose Donna is uneasy
by this time. She won't stand at night--she's got to. I'll get that
whim out of her. Now, don't look that way. The horse is safe enough.
Don't you suppose I know how to drive? You're always having opinions
of your own against mine. There. I must be off."
"Where's the baby, Helen?" I turned, with my hand upon the latch of my
heavy oaken door, and jerked the question out, as cross men do.
"The baby isn't just right, somehow, Esmerald. I bated to bother you,
for you never think it is anything. I dare say he will be better, but
I thought I wouldn't let him come out of the nursery. Jane is with
him. I've been a _little_ troubled about him. He has cried all the
afternoon."
"He cries because you coddle him!" I exploded. "It is all nonsense,
Helen. Nothing ails the child. I won't encourage this sort of thing.
I'll see him when I come home. I can't possibly wait--I am driven to
death--for every little whim"--
But at the door I stopped. If the baby had been a patient he would
have seen no doctor that night. But the father in me got the better of
me, and without a word further to my wife I ran up to the nursery.
She stayed below; she perceived (Helen was always quick), although I
had not said so, that I did not wish her to follow me. I examined the
child hastily. The little fellow stopped crying at the sight of me,
and put up both arms to be taken. I said:--
"No, Boy. Papa can't stop now," and put him gently back into his crib.
When I had reached the nursery door I remember that I returned and
kissed him. I was very angry, but I could not be angry with my baby.
With the touch of his little lips, dewy and sweet, upon mine, I rushed
down to my wife, and tempestuously began again:--
"Helen, I must have an end to this nonsense. Nothing ails the baby; he
is only a trifle feverish with a new tooth. It really is very
unpleasant to me that you make such a fuss over him. If you had
married a greengrocer it might have been pardonable. Pray remember
that you have married a physician who understands his business, and do
leave me to manage it. Take the child out of the nursery. Carry him
downstairs as usual for a few minutes. He will sleep better. There!
I'm eight minutes behindhand already, all for this senseless anxiety of
yours. It is a pity you can't trust me, like other men's wives! I
wish I'd married a woman with a little wifely spirit!--or else not
married at all."
I shut the door; I am afraid I slammed it. I cleared the steps at a
bound, and ran fiercely out into the night air. The wind was rising,
and the weather was growing sharp. It was frosty and noisy. Donna, my
chestnut mare, stood pawing the pavement in high temper, and called to
me as she heard my step. She had dragged at her weight a little; she
was thoroughly displeased with the delay. It occurred to me that she
felt as I had acted. It even occurred to me to go back and tell my
wife that I was ashamed of myself.
I turned and looked in through the parlour windows. The shades were
up, and the gas was low. Dimly beyond, the bright panel of the lighted
library arose between the crimson curtains. She stood against it,
midway between the two rooms. Her hands had dropped closed one into
the other before her. Her face was toward the street. She seemed to
be gazing at me, whom she could not see. Her white dress, which hung
in thick folds, the pallor of her face and her delicate hands, gave her
the look of a statue; its purity, and to my fancy at that moment its
permanence. She seemed to be carved there, like something that must
stay.
I turned to go back--yes, I would have gone. It is little enough for a
man to say for himself under circumstances like these; but perhaps I
may be allowed to say it, since to exculpate myself is the last of my
motives. I had made a stop or two up the flagging between the deep
grass-plots that fronted the house, when the mare, disturbed beyond
endurance at a movement of delay which she too well understood, gave a
shrill whinny, and reared, pulling and dragging at her weight fiercely.
She was a powerful creature, and the weight yielded, hitting at her
heels. In an instant she had cramped the wheels, and I saw that the
buggy would go over. To spring back, reach the bit, snatch the reins,
leap over the wheel, and whirl away in the reeling carriage was the
work of some thing less than a thought; it was the elemental instinct
by which a man must manage his horse, come life or death.
Like most doctors, I was something of a horseman, and the idea of being
thwarted by any of Donna's whims had never occurred to me. I knew that
the horse was pulling hard, but beyond that, I could not be said to
have knowledge, much less fear; the mad conflict between the brute and
the man possessed me to the exclusion of intelligence.
It was some moments before it struck me that my own horse was running
away with me.
My first, perhaps I may say my only emotion at the discovery was one of
overpowering rage.
I did not mean to strike her. No driver, ever if an angry one, would
have done that. But I had the whip in my hand, around which the reins
were knotted for the struggle, and when the horse broke into a gallop
the jerk gave her a flick. I was not in the habit of whipping her.
She felt herself insulted. It was now her turn to be angry; and an
angry runaway means a bad business. Donna put down her head, struck
out viciously from behind, and kicked the dasher flat. From that
moment I lost all control of her.
I thought:--
"She is headed down town. At this rate, in five minutes she will be in
the thick of travel. I have so many minutes more."
For how long I cannot tell, I had beyond this no other intelligent
idea. Then I thought;--
"I should not like to be the man who has got to tell Helen." This
repeated itself dully: "I should not care to be the fellow who will be
sent to tell Helen."
I had ceased to call to the mare; it only made matters worse; but there
was great hubbub in the streets as we leaped on. There were several
attempts to head her off, I think. One man caught at her bridle. This
frightened her; she threw him off, and threw him down. I think she
must have hurt him. We were now well down town. Window lights and
carriage lights flared by deliriously. The wind, which was high, at
speed like that seemed something demoniac. I remember how much it
added to my sense of danger. I remember that my favourite phrase
occurred to me:--
"_I am driven to death._"
Suddenly I saw approaching an open landau. The street was full of
vehicles, some of which I was sure to run down; but none of them seemed
to give me concern except this one carriage. It contained a lady and a
little boy, patients of mine. I recognized them forty feet away. He
was a pretty little fellow, and she was fond of me; sent for me for
everything; trusted me beyond reason; could not live without her
doctor--that kind of patient. She had been a great sufferer. It
seemed infernal to me that it should be _they_.
I shouted to her coachman:--
"Henry! For God's sake--to the left! To the _left_!"
But Henry stared at me like one struck dead. I thought I heard him
say;--
"Marm, it's the _doctor_!" and after that I heard no more.
As the crash came, I saw the woman's face. She had recognized me with
her look of sweet trustfulness; it froze to mortal horror. She clasped
the child. I saw his cap come off from his yellow curls, and one
little hand tossed out as the landau went over. The mare, now mad as
any maniac, ran on.
Something had broken, but it mattered little what. I think we turned a
corner. I think she struck a lamp-post or a tree. At all events, the
buggy went over; and, scooped into the top, and dragged, and blinded,
and stunned, I came to the ground.
As I went down, I uttered the two words of all that are human, most
solemn; perhaps, one may add, most automatic. Believer or sceptic,
saint or sinner, mortal danger hurls them from us, as it wrests the
soul from out our bodies.
I said, "_My God!_" precisely as I threw out my arms, to catch at
whatever could hold me when I could no longer hold myself.