"As you are still in touch with her; and, as the situation is probably
already partly known to you, I thought you might be able--willing--" He
hesitated, paused; and a grieved look came into his eyes that was quite
genuine. I realized the fact coldly.
"Whatever I can do," I assured him, "I shall be glad to."
"None of us," he continued, "have seen Lisbeth since that terrible night
four years ago, when she turned Con away from her house."
I hesitated for a moment and then said: "It was three o'clock in the
morning, if I remember, and he had written that he was coming to take
her little son into the country, to give him a chance," I added
bitingly, "of some real country air."
"It was a cold night," continued Lin Darton, as though he had not heard
me, "and she has all she needs--while he--"
"To my mind, he had no business there!" I flared.
"He was her father."
He stared at me hard, as though he had uttered the final, indisputable
word.
"He forfeited all right to that title years ago."
"When?" demanded Mr. Darton.
"On the day of her birth," I snapped back at him.
"I do not understand you," he said coldly. And, when I remained silent,
he added: "There is no greater crime than that of a child towards a
father."
"Unless it be, perhaps, that of a father towards a child."
His sadness seemed to weigh him against the desk. I relented.
"To go against one's _own_--_against one's own_," he repeated, "and Con
so sick now--"
"You must forgive me, Mr. Darton, for my views," I said more gently,
"and tell me what I can do."
He pulled himself together at that.
"Con's all gone to pieces, you know--at the old mill house--no money--no
one to care for him. We wanted you to come out with us. Perhaps medical
care might, even now--We thought maybe," he interrupted himself hastily,
"that you could get Lisbeth to help out too--and maybe come herself--"
"Come herself!" I repeated, and my voice must have sounded the sick fear
that struck me.
"Money's not the only thing that counts when it comes to one's own
blood," he said sententiously.
There were no two ways about it, that was his final stand. So, having
assumed them of my services that afternoon, I went straight to Lisbeth.
I found her bending over the youngest baby, and, when I told her, her
body became rigid for an instant, then she stooped lower that I might
not see the shadow that had fallen across her face. Finally she left the
child and came to me with that old look of misery in her face that I had
not seen there for so long, but with far more gentleness.
"Sit down here, Tom," she said, leading me to the window seat, where the
strands of sunlight struck against her head, giving fire to her
dull-brown hair. She had changed but slightly in appearance, I thought,
from the girl that I had known five years before; still there _was_ a
change, a certain assurance was there, and a graciousness that came from
the knowledge that she was loved.
"I think you know," she began, her eyes looking not at me but straight
ahead, "that I've been happy--these five years--though perhaps not how
happy. But in spite of it all--there is always that something--that
_fear_ here--clutching at me--that it may not all be real--that it can't
last."
Again she looked at me and turned away, but not before I had caught a
flash of terror in her eyes.
"Even with them all against me, Tom, I've stuck to it--to what I feel is
my right. This is my home--and it's Jim's home--and the children's as
well as it's mine--and, in a way, it's--inviolate. I've sworn that
nothing ugly shall come into it--nothing shall ruin it--the way our
lives were ruined out there!"
Her voice trembled, but her eyes, as she turned to me at the last, were
steady.
"I'll send something, of course," she said; "you will take it to them.
But I'll--not go."
With her message and her money I sought out Lin Darton and Miss Etta,
and together we rambled in their open Ford along those flat, dead
Illinois roads that I had not seen for so long.
It is a doctor's profession to save life, and there was a life to be
saved, if it were possible. But he was nearer to the end than I had
thought. Grega was there in that same barren room of the mill-house,
doing things in a stolid, undeft sort of way. The bed had been pulled
near the stove and the room was stuffier, more untidy than in the days
when Lisbeth had been there. The creaky bed, the unvarnished walls, and
the rusty alarm clock, that ticked insistently, all added to the sense
of flaccidity. The afternoon was late and already dark; sagging clouds
had gathered, shutting out what was left of the daylight. Miss Etta lit
a smudgy lamp, sniffling as she did so.
From under the torn quilt the man stared back at me, with much of his
old penetration, despite the fever that racked him.
"I--want--Lisbeth," were his first words to me.
I shook my head. "She cannot come just now," I told him, hand on his
wrist. "But we are here to do everything for you."
"Tel-e-phone her," he said with his old emphasis on each syllable, "and
tell--her that I'm--dy-ing. Don't answer me. You know that--_I--am
dy-ing and I--want--her_."
Miss Etta, the tears streaming over her large face, went to do his
bidding. I could hear her lumbersome footsteps going down the crazy
outside stairway. He gave me a triumphant look as I lifted his arm, then
abruptly he drew away from me. He had an ingrained fear of drugs of any
sort. There was no gainsaying his fierce refusals, so I made him as
comfortable as I could while we waited. The end was very near. His face,
thin almost to emaciation, was flushed to a deep, feverish red, but his
lips took on a more unbending line than ever and his eyes burned like
bits of phosphorescence in the semidarkness. For an hour he lay there
motionless with only the shadow of a smile touching his lips at
intervals.
Miss Etta had returned, letting in a gust of damp air, but bringing no
definite answer from Lisbeth. Would she come? I remembered her
unyielding decision, her unflinching sincerity. The rain broke now
suddenly, and came roaring down the hill towards the creek. Outside the
branches of elms dragged, with a snapping of twigs, across the brittle
roof. A rusty stream of water crawled sizzling down the pipe of the
stove. It was hot--hot with the intolerable hotness of steam. The
patchwork quilt looked thick and unsmoothed. I reflected that it never
could look smoothed. And how their personalities bore down upon one with
a swamping sensation! Miss Etta and Grega and Mr. Lin Darton were
gathered into a corner of the room and an occasional whispering escaped
them. The oppression was terrific. I began to want Lisbeth, to long for
her to come, as she would come, like a cool blade cutting through
density. And yet--I was not sure. I found myself staring through the
black, shiny surface of the window, seeking relief in the obscuring
dark. It gave little vision, except its own distorted reflections, but I
could distinguish vaguely the outlines of the old mill with the shadowly
raft in the high branches and the smudgy round spots that I knew to be
the turkeys roosting.
A fiercer current tore at the framework of the mill-house. The water
rapped pitilessly against the pane. The brownish stream thickened, as it
made its way down the stovepipe and fell in flat puddles on the tin
plate beneath it.--_Would she come?_
"If she doesn't come now!" whimpered Miss Etta. "An awful
girl--_awful_!"
I began hoping of a sudden that she would not come. Though I craved her
presence in that insufferable room, I was afraid for her. A sort of
nameless terror had seized me that would not be dismissed. Yet what
worse thing than she had already endured could come from that bundle of
loose clothes on the bed? The figure moved uneasily under the covers and
made an indefinite motion. I could only guess at the words addressed to
Miss Etta as she bent over him. She shook her head.
"No," she said audibly, "not yet."
With one brown, fleshless hand, that lay outside the covers, he made a
gesture of resignation, but the gray eyes, turning towards me, burned
black.
I could make out fragmentary bits of conversation that issued from the
corner of the room.
"When it comes to one's own blood--"
The rest was lost in a surge of wind and rain.
"An awful girl--"
"She ought to be--"
A low rumble came down the hill, followed by a more terrific onslaught
of rain. Outside the clap of a door came as a relief. There were steps,
then, just as I had expected, the door was thrust back and she stood
there letting in the fresh air of heaven, a slender sheaf of gray in her
long coat and small fur toque.
A satirical gleam of triumph gleamed across the sick man's face and
vanished, leaving him a wronged and silently passive creature.
"You can shut the door tight, now you've _come_," said Miss Etta. "A
draft won't do him any good."
With this greeting she turned her back. There was a moment's silence,
while Lisbeth pushed shut the flimsy door, and I, to cover her
embarrassment, helped her make it fast. I noticed then that she was
carrying a small leather case.
"Thermos bottles," she explained, as an aroma of comfort escaped them.
But the man on the bed shook his head, as she approached.
"Not now," he said plaintively. His look reproached her. Tears stood
thickly in Miss Etta's eyes. She pulled Lisbeth aside with a series of
jerks at her elbow.
"Too late for that now," I heard her whisper sententiously. And then:
"You had your chance."
I saw the hand, that disengaged Miss Etta's clutch, tremble; and for an
instant I thought the girl would break down under the benumbing
thickness of their emotion. But she merely unfastened her coat, walking
towards the window as though seeking composure, as I had, in the cold
shadows without, in the blurred outlines of the old mill and the
intrepid row of turkeys.
He beckoned to her, but she did not see him. Rapidly failing as he was,
I was certain that he was by no means without power of speech. I touched
her on the arm. His words came finally in monotonous cadences.
"I am dy-ing," he said. "You will--pray?"
I saw her catch her breath. My own hung in my throat and choked me. He
was watching her intently now with overweighted gray eyes, that could
not make one entirely forget the long cunning line of the mouth. What
courage did she have to withstand this? He was dying--of that there
could be little doubt. She had grown white to the roots of her hair.
"I do not pray," she said steadily.
His eyebrows met. "You--_do not pray_? Who--taught--you--_not to
p--ray_?"
"You did," she said quietly.
He lay back with a sigh.
"Outrageous!" murmured Miss Etta through her tears. "An awful
girl--_awful_!"
The man on the bed smiled. He lifted his hand and let it fall back on
the cover.
"It's all right--all right--all--right." The reddish-brown eyelids
closed slowly.
Involuntarily a wave of pity shook me. It was consummate acting. That a
man should play a part upon the very edge of life held in it something
awesome, compelling attention. I drew myself together, feeling his eyes,
sharp for all their floating sadness, upon me. Was he--? Was I--?--A
crackling of thunder shook the ground. When it had passed, the rain came
down straight and hard and windless like rapier thrusts. The room
seemed, if possible, closer, more suffocating. He beckoned to Lisbeth
and she went and stood near him. He was to put her through a still
harder ordeal.
"You have never cared for me," he whispered.
There was no sound except for the steady pour outside and the rustle of
Miss Etta's garments as she made angry motions to Lisbeth. Even at this
moment, I believe, had he shown sign of any honest wish for affection,
she would have given all she had.
"Not for many years," she said, and for the first time her voice shook.
"_Ah--h!_" His breath went inwards.
Suddenly he began to fumble among the bed clothes.
"The picture," he said incoherently, "your mother's picture. Pick it
up," he ordered, his eyelids drooping strangely. "No--no--under the
_bed_."
Before I could stop her she had dropped to her knees and was fumbling
among the rolls of dust under the bed. An overpowering dread had
clutched at me, forcing the air from my lungs. But in that instant he
had raised himself, by what must have been an almost incredible exercise
of will, and grabbed her by the throat.
"_Curse you!_" he cried, shaking her as one would a rat, "you and your
mother--_cur_--"
His hands dropped away, limp and brittle like withered leaves. He fell
back.--
* * * * *
Of course they will always find excuses for the dead, and eulogies. Even
as I helped her into Jim's small curtained car and took my place at the
wheel, I knew that the things that they would say about her would be
more than I could bear. We plunged forward, and a moment later, rounding
a curve, our headlights came full upon the outlines of the old farm with
its hideous false façade. I could not resist glancing at her, though I
said nothing. Her eyes were on her hands, held loosely in her lap. She
did not look at me until, with another lurch, we had swung about again,
and all but the road in front of us was drawn back swiftly into
obscurity. I found that she had turned towards me then, and, as I laid
one hand across her arm, I felt her relax to a relieved trembling.
Before us the night crowded down over the countryside, masking its
ugliness like a film, through which our lights cut a white fissure
towards town.