The shadow of death drew on apace to the sight of all, save the
consumptive, and her semi-imbecile mother. These seemed alike blind to
the fatal symptoms that were more strongly defined with every passing
day. The paralytic sat in her wheeled chair, in the March sunshine,
at the window of her chamber, and talked droningly of other times and
paltry pleasures to that one of her daughters or grand-children whose
turn it was to minister to her comfort and amusement, and insisted
upon having all the neighborhood news repeated in her dull ear with
wearisome--to the narrator--amplifications and reiterations, shaking
with childish laughter at the humorous passages, and whimpering at the
pathetic. Rosa cheated time of heaviness by unceasing demands upon her
attendants for service and diversion. Unable to sleep, except at long
intervals, in snatches of fitful dozing, she had a horror of being alone
for an instant, from dusk until dawn; was ingenious in contrivances
to surprise an unwary watcher nodding upon her post; plenteous and
plaintive in lamentations, if the device succeeded. Fifty times a night
her pillows must be shaken, her drink, food, or medicine given, and
after each of these offices had been performed, occurred the petition:
“Now--sit where I can see you whenever I open my eyes! It drives me
crazy to imagine for a moment that I am by myself. I want to be sure
all the while that some living human being is near at hand. I have such
frightful dreams! I awake always with the impression that I am drowning
or suffocating, or floating away into a sea of darkness alone!”
With the light of day, her spirits revived, and her hopes of speedy
recovery.
“You need not grudge waiting upon me now, for I shall be up and about
shortly--well and spry as the best of you!” she would say. “And while I
am playing invalid, I mean to have my quantum of attention. I have been
avaricious of devotion all my life, and this is a golden chance that may
never happen again.”
Her husband she would not willingly suffer to leave her for an instant.
But for Mrs. Sutton's management and kindly authority, he would have
been condemned to take his meals at her bedside and from the same tray
with herself. She would be removed from the bed to the lounge by no
other arms than his, and at any hour of the twenty-four he was liable
to be called upon to read, sing, or talk her into composure. Variable as
ever in mood and fancy, and more capricious in the exhibition of these,
she was fond, sullen, teasing, and mirthful with him as the humor of
the moment dictated; sometimes assailing him with reproaches for his
indifference and want of regard for her wishes and tastes, now that she
was no longer young, pretty, and sprightly; at others, clinging to him
with protestations of repentance and love, bewailing her waywardness and
imploring his forbearance; then, taking him to task for the slightest
inadvertence--the spilling of a drop of her medicine or jarring of her
sofa or bed; anon lauding him to the skies as the most skilful nurse she
had, and enjoining upon all about her to render verbal testimonial
to his irreproachableness as husband and man--oh! it was a wearisome,
oftentimes a revolting duty to listen to and bear with it all--keep in
mind though one did that the intolerable restlessness preluded centuries
of dreamless repose.
Mrs. Sutton could endure everything else better--and she believed that
it was the same with Frederic--than the needless and puerile trickery to
which Rosa resorted to achieve the most trivial purposes. If she wished
that one of her sisters should pass the day with her, or to sit up for
a part of the night, she worked upon her by means of others'
intercessions, or broached the subject by covert passages, the end of
which, she flattered herself, was successfully masked, until her train
was ready for explosion. Did she set her fancy upon any particular
article of diet, the same tortuous course was pursued to present the
delicacy in question to the mind of him or her who, she designed, should
be the provider. Under her sauciest rattle of fun or perversity lurked
some subtle meaning. She had either some end to subserve, or wanted to
possess herself of some bit of information she could have gained sooner
and more easily by direct inquiry. Cajolery and intrigue had become a
second nature, stronger than the original; and it never occurred to her
that her wiles, in her mental and bodily decadence, were transparent as
they had once been artful.
A discovery, made on the fourth day of her visit, excited Mrs. Sutton's
sympathies in behalf of the much enduring husband to a pitch it required
long and serious pondering upon the wife's weakness and critical
condition to restrain from indignant demonstration.
Rosa was sleeping more soundly than usual under the influence of an
anodyne, and Frederic, with a whispered apology to his coadjutor, went
into the next room, leaving the door ajar. From her seat, Mrs. Sutton
had a distinct view of him in an opposite mirror--a circumstance of
which she was not aware for several minutes. Happening, then, to look
up from her knitting she saw that he was writing, and half an hour
afterward that he was leaning back in his chair, looking at something
in the hollow of his hand, a mingling of such love and sadness in his
countenance that she felt it would be unlawful prying into his most
sacred feelings for her to watch him longer. He turned his head at the
slight rustle she made in removing to another part of the room, and
beckoned to her. At her approach, he arose and held out a morocco case,
containing the miniature of a child--a bright-eyed, delicate-featured
girl of seven or eight summers--exquisitely painted.
“You have never seen my little Florence, I think?”
“I have not. She is pretty--and resembles you strongly.”
He did not color or laugh at the unconscious compliment, or seem pleased
at her praise of his darling. Instead, there crept over his face a shade
of more painful sadness, darkening his eyes and compressing his lip, as
he answered--
“So every one says. She is the dearest child in the world--a sunbeam of
gladness in any house--amiable, affectionate, and intelligent. I wish
you would read her last letter to me. She is a better correspondent than
many grown people.” Then, smiling, apologetically, “If my commendation
seem overstrained, you will excuse a father's partiality.”
The letter--although the unformed chirography betrayed the writer's
inexperience in pen-practice--was correctly spelled and easy in
style, crowded with loving messages to “dear papa and mamma;” relating
anecdotes of school and home life, and while expressive of her longings
for her parents' return, professing willingness to stay where she was
“until mamma should be well enough to come back.”
“I pray every night that God will cure her, and make us all happy
again,” she wrote. “I dreamed one night last week that I saw her dressed
for a party, all rosy and funny and laughing, as she used to be, and
that she kissed me, and put her arm around me, and called me 'baby
Florence' and 'little one,' in her sweet voice. Wasn't it strange? I
awoke myself crying, I was so happy! I do try to be brave, and not fret
about what cannot be helped, papa, because I promised you I would; but
sometimes it is right hard work. It is always easier for a whole day
after I get one of your nice, long letters. It is not QUITE as good as
having real talk with you, but it is the best treat I can have when you
are away.”
Mrs. Sutton wiped her eyes.
“The dear child!” she said, in the subdued tone habitual to the
frequenters of the sick-room. “No wonder you want to see her! Why didn't
you give her a holiday, and bring her to Virginia with you?”
“I dreaded the effect of a child's high animal spirits and thoughtless
bustle upon her mother's health”--the shadow thickening into trouble.
“The next best thing to having her with me is to know that she is kindly
and lovingly looked after by my married sister, of whom she is very
fond. Florence is merrier, if not always happier, with her young cousins
than if she were condemned to the repression and joyless routine of
a house where the care of the sick is the most engrossing business to
all.”
The more Mrs. Sutton meditated upon this conversation, the more
enigmatical it appeared that the mother never spoke of missing her only
living child--never pined for the sound of her vivacious talk and the
sight of her winning ways. Curiosity--her strong love for all children,
and a lively interest in Florence and Florence's father, the two who
assuredly did feel the separation--got the ascendency over discretion
that night, when Rosa, too nervous to sleep, begged her to talk, “to
scare away the horrors that were sitting, a blue-black brood, upon her
pillow.”
“Your little daughter would be an endless source of entertainment to
you if she were here,” said downright Aunt Rachel, with no show of
circumlocution. “I am surprised you do not send for her.”
“Children of that age are a nuisance!” returned Rosa, peevishly. “And
of all tiresome ones that I ever saw, Florence is the most trying. She
doesn't talk after I bid her hold her tongue, but her big, solemn eyes
see and her ears hear all that passes. If there is one thing that pushes
me nearer to the verge of distraction than another it is to have my own
words quoted to me when I have forgotten that I ever uttered them. And
she--literal little bore!--is always pretending to take all that I say
in earnest. If I were to tell her to go to Guinea, it is my belief
she would put on her bonnet, cloak, and gloves, pocket a biscuit for
luncheon and a story-book to read by the way, and set out forthwith,
asking the first decent-looking man she met in the street at what wharf
she would find a vessel bound for Africa.”
Mrs. Sutton was obliged to laugh.
“She must be a truthful, sincere little thing!”
“Didn't I tell you she is TOO outrageously literal and unimaginative?
Just let me give you an example of how she tires and vexes me. One day,
about a fortnight before I left home, she set her heart upon spending
the whole of Saturday afternoon with me. Her father objected, for he
understands, if he does not sympathize with me, what a trial she is to
flesh and spirit. But I was moderately comfortable, and my nerves were
less unruly than usual, so I said we would try and get on together.
“No sooner had he gone than the catechism commenced:
“'Now, mamma, what can I do to amuse you?'
“She talks like a woman of fifty.
“'What should you propose if I were to leave it to you?' I asked.
“'I suppose,' said my Lady Cutshort, 'that it would excite you too much
to talk, so I had better read aloud. What book do you prefer?'
“I named one--a novel I had not finished--and resigned myself to
martyrdom. She reads fluently--her father says prettily; but the
piping voice rasped my auriculars to the quick, and I soon stopped the
exhibition. Then we essayed conversation, but our range of themes was
limited, and a dismal silence succeeded to a short dialogue. By and by I
told her that I was sleepy, hoping she would take the hint and leave my
room.
“'Then, mamma, I will just get my work-basket, and sit here, as still as
a mouse, and prevent all disturbance.'
“With that, she gets out her miniature thimble and scissors, and falls
to work upon a pair of slippers she was embroidering for her father's
birthday present, sitting up, starched and prim as an old maid, her lips
pursed, and her forehead gravely consequential. I could not close my
eyes without seeing her still, like an undersized nightmare, her
hair smooth to the least hair, her dress neat to the smallest fold,
stitching, stitching, the affected, conceited marmoset!
“At last I said:
“'Put down your sewing, Florence, and look out of the window at the
people going by. You must be very tired.'
“'Not in the least, mamma, dear,' answered Miss Pert. 'I like to work,
and there is nothing interesting going on outside.'
“I tossed and sighed, and she was by me in a second.
“'Darling mamma! my poor, sweet little mother!' in her reed-like chirp;
'can I do nothing to make you feel better?' putting her hands upon my
head and stroking my face until my flesh crawled.
“'Yes,' said I, out of all patience. 'Take yourself off, and don't
let me see you again until to-morrow morning! You kill me with your
teasing.'
“And would you believe it? she just put up her sewing in the basket and
went directly out, without a tear or a murmur, and when her father
came home he could not prevail upon her, by commands or persuasions,
to accompany him further than the door of my chamber. So he, who won't
admit that she can do anything wrong, instead of whipping her for her
obstinacy, as he ought to have done, guessed she 'had some reason' for
her disobedience which she did not like to tell, and interrogated poor,
persecuted me. When he had heard my version of the manner in which we
had spent the afternoon, he only said, 'I should have foreseen this. But
the child--she is only a child, Rosa!--did her best!' and he looked
so mournful that I, knowing he blamed me for his bantling's freak of
temper, told him plainly that he cared a thousand times more for this
diminutive bundle of hypocrisy than he ever did for me, and that his
absurd favoritism was fast begetting in me a positive dislike for her. I
couldn't endure the sight of the sulky little mischief-maker for a week
after her complaint of barbarity had brought the look into his face I
knew so well.”
“O Rosa, she is your own flesh and blood! and, as her father said, a
mere baby yet! You said, too, that she refused to assign any cause to
him for her singular conduct.”
“She might better have made open outcry than have left upon his mind
the impression that I had banished her cruelly and unnecessarily. But
I despair of giving you an idea of how provoking she can be. She is a
Chilton, through and through, in feature, manner, and disposition--one
of those 'goody' children, you know! a class of animals that are simply
intolerable to me. She is too precocious and unbaby-like to be in the
least interesting. You should have seen my little Violet to understand
what a constant disappointment Florence is. She was myself in miniature,
and moreover the most witching, prankish, peppery elf that was ever
made. The best trait in Florence's character was her love for her
baby-sister. She gave up everything to her while she was alive, and they
told me that she would not eat, and scarcely slept, for days after her
death. Her father will have it that she is singularly sensitive, and
has marvellous depths of feeling; but if this be so, it is queer I
never found it out. Nobody could help adoring Violet--my sweet, lost,
beautiful angel!”
The hysterical sobs were pumping up the tears now in hot torrents, and
these Mrs. Sutton was fain to assuage by loving arts she would not--but
for the danger of allowing them to flow--have been in the temper to
employ, so full was her heart of yearning pity for the hardly-used
babe, and displeasure at the mother's weak selfishness. It was easier to
forgive and forget Rosa's sins; to lessen, in the retrospect, her worst
faults into foibles, than it would have been to overlook the more venal
failings of one less mercurial, and whose personal fascinations did not
equal hers.
Ere the close of another day, Mrs. Sutton had excused her unnatural
insensibility to her child's virtues and affection, by representing to
herself how fearfully disease had warped judgment and perception; had
cast over the enormities she could not palliate the pall of solemn
remembrance of the truth that death's dark door was already as surely
shut between mother and daughter, as if the grave held the former. A
week of chill March rains and wind was disastrous to the patient, who
had seemed to draw her main supplies of strength from the sunshine
admitted freely to her room, with the spring air, redolent with the
delicious odors of the freshly-turned earth, the budding trees, and
early blossoms from the garden beneath her windows. She shrank and
shivered under the ungenial sky, while the drizzling mist soaked life
and animation out of the fragile body. Occasional fits of delirium,
increased difficulty of breathing, and a steady decline of the slender
remains of vital force, warned her attendants that their care would not
be required much longer. She was still obstinate in her disbelief of the
grave nature of her malady. The most distant reference to her decease
would arouse her to angry refutation of the hinted doubt of her
recovery, and excited her to offer proof of her declaration that she was
less ill than others supposed; she would summon up a poor counterfeit
of energy and mirth, more ghastly than her previous lassitude; deny
that she suffered from any cause, save the unfailing nervous depression
consequent upon the unfavorable weather.
Then came a day on which the sun looked forth with augmented splendor
from his sombrely curtained pavilion; when the naked branches of the
deciduous trees, the serried lances of the evergreens, and the
broad leaves of the tent-like magnolias--the pride of the Tazewell
place--shone as from a bath of molten silver. The battered flowers
ventured into later and healthier bloom, and a robin, swinging upon
the lilac spray nearest Rosa's window, sang blithe greeting to the
reinstated spring.
Rosa heard him--opened her eyes, and smiled.
“One--maybe the very same--used to sing there every morning when I was a
girl--used to awake me from my second nap. I could sleep all night then,
and never dream once!”
A messenger had been sent, at daybreak, for her sisters and brother, who
resided several miles away, but as yet Mrs. Sutton and Frederic were her
only nurses. She had dozed almost constantly during the night, and
been delirious when awakened to take nourishment or tonics, muttering
senseless and disconnected words, and moaning in pain, the location and
nature of which she could not describe to the solicitous watchers.
“I remember that Mabel and I,” she continued, dreamily, after a long
pause--then correcting herself, “I ask your pardon, Frederic! I said I
wouldn't speak of her ever again to you, but we were so much together in
those days. Moreover, it has troubled me at times, that you did not know
who your real friends were, and she did like you--and--and--what am I
saying! You shouldn't let me run on so!”
She raised her hand with difficulty, and tried to wipe away the film
gathering over her dilated eyes.
“Never mind, my darling! Do not attempt to talk! You are too weak and
tired!” said her husband, tenderly.
“Tired!” catching at the word, “That is it! There is nothing else the
matter, whatever Dr. Ritchie and the rest of them may say. Tired! for
how many years I have been THAT! It seems like a thousand. This world is
a tiresome place to most people, I think I shall never forget how jaded
Mabel looked that week,” breaking off, as before, with a frightened
start, such as a dreamer gives when he fancies he is falling from an
immeasurable height. “Indeed, Fred, dear!” feeling for his hand upon
the coverlet, “I did not mean to wound or offend you. It was a terrible
ordeal for you, my love! But you came out of it as silver seven times
refined. That is what the text says--isn't it? And you and Aunt Rachel
are friends once more! That is one good deed I have done. I hope it
will be recorded up THERE! Heaven knows there are not so many that I can
afford to have one overlooked!”
Another season of dozing, and she awoke, rubbing her hands feebly
together, as to cleanse them.
“My hands ought to be whiter--purer! I know what ails them. I should
have picked up the letter she--Mrs. Sutton--wrote you. But I loved you
so--even then!” beseechingly. “You will not hate me when I am gone? I
mean when you get back to Philadelphia, and I am well enough to be left
here. I was sure, if you got it, you would come to Ridgeley, and I let
it go down the stream--down--down! Frederic!”
“I am here, dearest!” slipping his arm under, and raising her, as her
shrill cry rang out, and she grasped the empty air. “Rosa, my WIFE!”
“I thought I was strangling--in the water! I am your wife--am I not? She
couldn't take you from me if she were here. I wish she were! I always
liked Mabel. She was a good, true woman--but she did not love you as I
did!”
Panting for breath, she leaned upon her husband's breast, and her
eyelids fell together again. Only for a moment! Then a smile--fond,
sweet, and penitent--played among the ashy shadows encircling her mouth.
“Poor little Florence! I am sorry I was cross to her. Tell her so,
papa!” Her husband stooped to kiss her, laid her back upon the pillows,
closed the sightless eyes, and left Mrs. Sutton alone with the dead.