I
I would rather not dwell upon the details of Annunziata's illness. By
the mercy of Providence, she got well in the end; but in the mean time
those details were sufficiently painful. John, for example, found it
more than painful to hear her cry out piteously, as she often would in
her delirium, that she did not wish to be turned into a monkey; he hung
his head and groaned, and cursed the malinspired moment which had given
that chimæra birth. However, he had his compensations. Maria Dolores,
whom he had thought never to see again, he saw every day. "Let us hope
that you and she may never meet again." In his despairing heart the
words became a refrain. But an hour later the news of trouble at the
presbytery had travelled to the pavilion, and she flew straight to
Annunziata's bedside. Ever since, (postponing those threatened nuptials
at Mischenau), she had shared with John, and the parroco, and Marcella
the cook, the labours of nurse. And though it was arranged that the men,
turn and turn about, should watch by night, and the women by day, John,
by coming early and leaving late, contrived to make a good part of his
vigil and of hers coincident. And the strange result is that now,
looking backwards upon that period of pain and dread, when from minute
to minute no one knew what awful change the next minute might
bring,--looking backwards, and seeing again the small bare room,
cell-like, with its whitewashed walls, its iron cot, its Crucifix, its
narrow window (through which wide miles of valley shone), and then the
little white face and the brown curls tossing on the pillow, and the
woman of his love sitting near to him, in the intimacy of a common care
and common duties,--the strange result is that John feels a glow in his
heart, as at the memory of a period of joy.
"Oh, do not let them turn me into a monkey. Oh, Holy Mother, I am so
afraid. Oh, do not let them!" Annunziata cried, shuddering, and
shrinking deeper into bed, towards the wall.
John hung his head and wrung his hands. "My God, my God!" he groaned.
"You should not blame yourself," Maria Dolores said in a low voice,
while she bathed the child's forehead, and fanned her face. "Your
intention was good, you could not foresee what has happened, and it may
be for the best, after all,--it may strengthen her 'will to live,' which
is the great thing, the doctor says."
She had spoken English, but Annunziata's next outcry was like a
response.
"Oh, to live, to live--I want to live, to live Oh, let me live!"
But at other times her wandering thoughts took quite a different turn.
Gazing solemnly up into Maria Dolores' face, she said, "He does not even
know her name, though he fears it may be Smitti. I thought it was Maria
Dolores, but he fears it may be Smitti."
John looked out of the window, pretending not to hear, and praying, I
expect, that Maria Dolores' eyes might be blinded and her counsel
darkened. At the same time, (Heaven having sent me a laughing hero), I
won't vouch that his shoulders didn't shake a little.