A PROJECTED ATONEMENT
Stephen's forty-second birthday fell upon the day on which he made the
final arrangements for Hilda's residence at the King Sanatorium. He had
not seen her because she was obsessed by fear of him, and he sat in the
office until the superintendent returned with Mayne and Dr. Good. Even
Dr. King, sanguine as his temperament was, was in this case not hopeful.
"The family history is not encouraging," he explained, with deepest
commiseration for Stephen, deprived before middle life of an attractive
companion. "But you must not despair."
"Is her physical condition also likely to grow worse?" asked Mayne.
He did not mop his brow upon this occasion; he felt, not without
self-reproach, a deep relief.
"We can't prophesy about that. We have had patients of her type who
have lived for a long time and others who lived only a few months."
"What do you mean by a long time?"
"Well, for some years," said Dr. King in his kind voice.
Stephen rose and took his hat from the table. He was depressed and
intensely nervous. Mayne's large body and the superintendent's sympathy
and Dr. Good's bright, observant eyes irritated him.
"She's to have, of course, every possible attention. You have Professor
Mayne's address and mine."
"We make weekly reports unless we are directed otherwise. In case of
an unusual development we should telephone you. You understand, Dr.
Lanfair, that Mrs. Lanfair's attitude toward you is a part of her
malady?"
"I understand perfectly."
At the door Mayne and Stephen bade one another good-bye. Both
remembered a thin, eager boy with a black band on his gray sleeve and a
short, slender, black-eyed girl.
"It's hard on you, Stephen."
"And on you."
Stephen stepped into his car beside Fickes. For a while he stared at
the floor, his arms folded, his mind a blank. Gradually the expression
of his eyes changed, the pupils darkened. There waited for him at
the hospital a woman who had hastened a slow fire with coal oil; the
problem was even more difficult than that of Mrs. Fetzer, but he had
determined to solve it. He planned a course of treatment. He would
offer to take the next twenty burned cases at the hospital.
Presently he lifted his head and glanced about at a landscape which
recalled his visit to Edward Levis--was it two years or ten since he
had made his sudden descent upon him? Here was a friend! He believed
that he could even tell Levis his troubles; it would do him good. He
sat a little more erectly.
Then suddenly an electric thrill passed through his body. He was free!
Tears pressed upon his eyelids--he turned his head so that Fickes might
not see them--tears of profound relief. What anxiety and torment had
been his! And it was past, decently past, and he had played the part of
a man throughout. Moreover, no public shame, no irremediable disaster
had terminated the nightmare. Hilda's valedictory was heard by only a
few persons,--her uncle, Dr. Good, Fetzer, upon whose devotion he could
stake all that he had in the world, and this unknown but apparently
trustworthy creature through whose quickness a serious calamity had
been avoided. He would tell Miss Knowlton and Miss MacVane where Hilda
was, and he would inform a few of the older friends whom she had
inherited from her parents, and to whom she had paid an indifferent
attention; then all would be concluded except the pitiful end of her
poor life.
They had begun to descend the hill toward the Kloster, and Stephen
looked at it curiously. When he visited Levis they would come over
here and prowl about. Ah, there were a thousand things to do in the
world, a thousand places to visit! Hilda had liked only main-traveled
roads on which there were theaters and shops; they had never seen the
interesting countries, the Far North, the tropics, Ceylon, Carcassone,
the church of Brou, the Far East. He was able to smile at the old
white-bearded man pottering about among the graves in the cemetery of
the Kloster, as though he smiled at Time himself.
Opening the door of his office he found Miss Knowlton and Miss MacVane
and went at once to work. There were a dozen patients waiting, and
as many to be informed that he had returned. Miss Knowlton smiled at
Miss MacVane when he began to prescribe for a patient whose treatment
would be extended. He meant evidently to stay. But at other times he
had meant to stay and had been persuaded to go away. When he said that
Hilda was in the King Sanatorium they expressed their regret and went
on with their work. They were conscientious souls and both felt a vague
self-reproach.
When he had had his dinner he returned to his office. But he was tired;
he would go for a walk. The night was clear, the air soft, and the
river reflected the stars. He ran up to his room, where he found his
housemaid engaged in laying back the covers of his bed. Ellen expected
to go out and she had coiled her hair on top of her head in the
transforming fashion condemned by Fetzer. She looked up and answered
Stephen's "Good-evening" with a bright flush. Her heart beat quickly;
it seemed to her now that it was never quiet. Stephen looked at her,
confused, as though she were a stranger.
"It's a warm night, isn't it?"
"Yes," said Ellen, "but there'll be a breeze from the river."
"Are you fond of the river?"
"It gets to seem like a friend."
She smiled and moved toward the door. She had learned her lesson well;
while she was a housemaid she would do as housemaids did--or should.
She carried with her now a pleasant anticipation--she had changed her
mind, some day she would tell Stephen who she was. But the time was not
yet ripe. In the doorway she paused.
"Would you like me to move your bed to the bay-window each evening?"
Stephen was watching her free walk and her straight shoulders and
wishing for some young creature to walk and talk with, some boy or girl
like this.
"Did you speak to me?"
She repeated her question.
"O, thank you; I'll do that when I want to sleep there."
He decided not to walk; he would call on Dr. and Mrs. Salter and tell
them about Hilda and ask them to tell certain other persons. It was a
duty which seemed suddenly pressing.
He continued through the spring to work all day and a part of the
night. He had never felt more alert; after a while he attributed his
alertness to freedom from anxiety. What might a man not accomplish
under circumstances which were entirely favorable--with health and
fortune and domestic happiness?
It was with a sense of amusement that he found himself thinking
presently of the one creature in his house who was young. It was
pleasant to meet her once or twice a day and see the color deepen in
her cheeks. He did not realize that it was meeting him which made her
flush; it was simply that she had color which came and went easily. She
was always quiet, always unobtrusive, always low-voiced. She smiled,
but he had never heard her laugh.
He began to be curious about her, but he asked no questions either of
her or of Fetzer. He would learn, of course, that she was merely a
dull country girl and the impression of intelligence given by a single
instance of quick-wittedness would vanish when she began to talk. She
seemed to have within her some spring of interest or satisfaction, but
he could not guess what it was. But dull or not, she was very lovely.
Then one warm, bright night when sleeping seemed a waste of time,
Stephen found his narrow bed pushed to the window. He smiled; then
suddenly he grew pale and turned on his heel and began to walk up
and down the room. He folded his arms across his breast as though to
hold by force some leaping savage, unrighteous, thing. He was not so
much appalled as astounded. He went down to his office and brought up
Farmingham on the Muscles of the Eye. At three o'clock he laid the book
down and turned out his light, smiling a little weakly at himself. He
refused to connect this absurdity with any individual; he believed it
was an effect of too close application to work.
In a third-story room neatly arranged was the overflow of his
professional library, pamphlets and magazines which waited binding,
and books which had passed their usefulness, but which he might still
need for reference. On the day after his vigil, going thither to find a
pamphlet, he passed Fetzer's room and came to the door of Ellen's room.
There he saw Ellen's little bed, her table with its books, its neatly
sharpened pencils, its vase of flowers. All was sweet and virginal and
childlike. He remembered that Fetzer had said long ago that the girl
studied; he was curious about her studies. He stepped in and lifted
the three books from the table. The first was a geometry, the second a
general history, the third a copy of "Vanity Fair" from his library. In
the geometry lay several sheets of paper covered with neat triangles
and circles.
He found his pamphlet and went downstairs slowly. He was indebted
to this girl who had helped him in a hard place. Did she wish more
education?--if so there was no reason why her ambition should not be
gratified. He was positive now that she was superior to her present
situation. His savings were large and his income constantly increasing;
it would be pleasant to help an ambitious student. A comfortable
philanthropic glow quite banished his lingering disgust at last night's
unpleasant experience.
After dinner he rang for Ellen, who came to his study a little
frightened. She had changed her black uniform for a white dress.
Stephen knew her straight shoulders and her free step, but he had
never realized quite the depth of her gaze when her eyes were squarely
encountered.
"Sit down, Ellen."
Ellen took the chair indicated to her. The light shone full on her dark
hair and her round chin and white neck. Something stirred again in
Stephen's breast.
"Fetzer tells me you're a student."
"Yes," answered Ellen, blushing.
"What do you study?"
"Geometry and history and English and other subjects."
"Why do you study?"
"I'm going to college."
"Oh, you are! When?"
"In September--that is, if I can make certain arrangements."
"What arrangements?"
"If I can pass the examinations. Miss MacVane thinks I can enter the
Sophomore class. I'm arranging to borrow a little from a fund for
students who need help."
"Why are you going to college?" Stephen leaned forward in his chair.
His interest in her quickened. To borrow from a fund, was she?
"I mean to be a doctor."
"A doctor!" Had Fetzer announced her intention of being an aviator, he
would have been no more surprised. "Why a doctor?"
"My father meant to educate me to be a doctor as he was." Then Ellen
leaned forward, her lips trembling. She could keep her secret no
longer--her heart seemed to burst with it. "Don't you remember me at
all?"
Stephen looked curiously into Ellen's face and thought of the hundreds
of patients in hospital and office. But even though there had been
hundreds he seldom forgot the eyes which he treated--certainly not such
eyes as these!
"Were you ever a patient of mine?"
Ellen shook her head; he could see her lips tremble. She seemed to
be unhappy because he did not remember her! What an extraordinary
experience! He had never been more puzzled or more charmed.
"Ellen Lewis is your name, Fetzer said. Is that right?"
"Ellen Levis is my name. They call me Lewis when they can't say 'v.'"
Still he stared without comprehension. Ellen grew pale with distress.
Was she the victim of an hallucination?
"Don't you remember _now_?"
"No." It was Stephen's turn to believe that some form of aphasia had
blotted out a part of his past.
"You came to see my father the day he died, you and Mrs. Lanfair."
Stephen frowned; his lifted hand covered his lips; then he leaned
backward into the shadow. He was shocked beyond expression.
"Not Edward Levis!" said he, at last quietly.
"Yes."
"You were the young girl who begged us to stay to supper? You were
studying with your father and you had a little table by the window?"
"Yes."
"Your father isn't _dead_!"
"He died that evening of heart trouble."
"How do you happen to be here?" asked Stephen sharply.
"I wanted to earn my living."
"Had your father no property?"
"I'm not of age."
"Why didn't you go on to college?"
"My grandfather and my brother thought I had enough education, and
the farm was run down and my brother thought the income should go to
improving it."
"Did they drive you away?"
"Oh, no! I came of my free will. They thought what they did was right.
It happened to suit Matthew's plans for the farm, but he would have
done right even if it had inconvenienced him."
"Did you expect to earn enough to go to college in a housemaid's
position?"
"No; but I earned something and I had a little. Then Miss MacVane
encouraged me--she had nothing, and yet she went to college."
"How did you happen to come here? Did Fetzer advertise?"
"No," answered Ellen with difficulty. "My father and I passed here
and he stopped and looked at your house. I came to look at it one day
because it reminded me of him. I was very forlorn. I think I was crying
and I crossed the street in front of an automobile and was struck and
Mrs. Fetzer befriended me."
"When did you recognize me?"
"When you came home."
"Why didn't you speak?"
"I couldn't."
"Did your father ever speak of me?"
"He wanted to make you executor of his will, but he couldn't complete
it."
"Why didn't you find me?"
"I couldn't remember your name."
Stephen leaned his chin upon his hand. He looked through Ellen at some
object far beyond her. He saw a bare room in a dingy old house in
Philadelphia, an old desk and his own head bent in remorse above it. He
had been grateful, Heaven bore witness, for a while.
"So you have everything arranged?" he said at last.
"Yes."
"And you are happy?"
"Yes. I've quite forgotten how unhappy and forlorn I used to be."
"The prospect of studying delights you?"
"Yes." Ellen lifted her eyes to his. "I used to think that learning was
everything, but I've found that it isn't. One needs satisfaction for
the mind, but one needs satisfaction for the heart also. It seemed to
me that I had nobody."
Stephen rose and went to the side of his desk and stood leaning upon it
and looking down at Ellen.
"And you feel that now you have somebody?"
"Yes. I'm older and more sensible and I realize that Grandfather and
Matthew are fond of me even though we think differently."
"And is this understanding of their affection sufficient food for the
heart?"
Ellen's look was still straightforward, but her cheeks crimsoned.
Fetzer would wonder where she stayed. She rose and stood before him.
"No."
"What else have you?"
"I have you," answered Ellen simply.
At that Stephen put his hand under Ellen's soft chin and lifted
her head. She smiled at him, and when Ellen smiled she invited
unconsciously more of a caress than a mere touch of hand. But he did
not move and she turned her cheek a little against the warm palm, then
went away. Her cup of happiness was full. Her father's desires had
hitherto been her law; she had now another law.
For a moment Stephen stood motionless beside his desk, then he began to
walk up and down. What an extraordinary chance! He began to lay plans.
She must come down out of her attic; she must wait no more upon him.
Fetzer and Miss MacVane and Miss Knowlton must be told at once who she
was, and there must be no slighting of her because she had done this
lowly work. One of his favorite occupations in periods of enforced
idleness in trains or on steamers had been the construction of various
schemes of education based upon what he felt were the deficiencies of
his own. He would see what could be done with this girl.
Presently he paused and stood for a long time motionless by his desk.
Levis dead! There had been hunger in Levis's eyes, hunger which he
might have satisfied. But no reproach should rest upon him henceforth;
he would do all for this girl that Levis could have done, perhaps he
might do more. He would atone. It was a moment of pure philanthropy,
unalloyed by any less exalted impulse.