THE HEART OF YOUTH
"Agatha Redmond, can you hear me?"
She caught the voice faintly, as if it were a child's cry.
"I'm right here, yes; only wait just a second." She could not
instantly free herself from her sandy coverings, but she was wide awake
almost at the first words James had spoken. Faint as the voice had
been, she recognized the natural tones, the strongest he had uttered
since coming out of the water.
The night had grown cold and dark, and at first she was a trifle
bewildered. She was also stiff and sore, almost beyond bearing. She
had to creep along the sand to where Jim lay. The fire had burned
wholly out, and the sand felt damp as she crawled over it. When she
came near, she reached out her hand and laid it on Jim's forehead. He
was shivering with cold.
"You poor man! And I sleeping while I ought to be taking care of you!
I'll make the fire and get some milk; there is still a little left."
As she tried to make her aching bones lift her to her feet, she became
aware that the man was fumbling at his coverings and trying to say
something.
She bent down to hear his words, which were incredibly faint.
"I don't want any fire or any milk. I only wanted to know if you were
there," he said diffidently, as if ashamed of his childishness.
She leaned over him, speaking gently and touching his head softly with
her firm, cool hands.
"You're a little better now, aren't you, after your sleep? Don't you
feel a little stronger?"
"Yes, I'm better, lots better," he whispered. "I must have been
sleeping for ages. When I woke up I thought I had a beastly chill or
something; but I'm all right now; only suddenly I felt as if I must
know if you were there, and if it _was_ you."
He smiled at his own words, and Agatha was reassured.
"I think you'll be still better for a little milk," she said, and crept
away to get the pail, which had been hidden on a shelf of rock. When
she came back with it, James tried manfully to sit up; but Agatha
slipped an arm under his neck, in skilful nurse fashion, and held the
bucket while he drank, almost greedily. As he sank back on his bed he
whispered: "You are very good to take care of me."
"Oh, no; I'm only too glad! And now I'm going to build up the fire
again; your hands are quite cold."
"No, don't go," he pleaded. "Please stay here; I'm not cold any more.
And you must go to sleep again. I ought not to have wakened you; and,
really, I didn't mean to."
"Yes, you ought. I've had lots of sleep; I don't want any more."
"It's dark, but it's better than it was that other night, isn't it?"
said James.
"Much better," answered Agatha.
James visibly gathered strength from the milk, and presently he took
some more. Agatha watched, and when he had finished, patted him
approvingly on the hand, "Good boy! You've done very well," she cried.
"I was so thirsty, I thought the whole earth had run dry. Will you
think me very ungrateful if I say now I wish it had been water?"
"Oh, no; I wish so, too. But Mr. Hand could only get us a little bit
from a spring, for there isn't any other pail."
It was some time before Jim made out to inquire, "Who's Mr. Hand?"
"He's the man that helped us--out of the water--when we became
exhausted."
Agatha hesitated to speak of the night's experience, uncertain how far
Jim's memory carried him, and not knowing how a sick man, in his
weakness, might be affected. Still, now that he seemed almost himself
again, save for the chill, she ventured to refer to the event, speaking
in a matter-of-fact way, as if such endurance tests were the most
natural events in the world. James' speech was quite coherent and
distinct, but very slow, as if the effort to speak came from the depths
of a profound fatigue.
"Hand--that's a good name for him. I thought it was the hand of God,
which plucked me, like David, or Jonah, or some such person, out of the
seething billows. But I didn't think of there being a man behind."
Then, after a long silence, "Where is he?"
"He's gone off to find somebody to help us get away from here: a
carriage or wagon of some sort, and some food and clothes."
Something caused Jim to ejaculate, though quite feebly, "You poor
thing!" And then he asked, very slowly, "Where is 'here'?"
"I don't know; and Mr. Hand doesn't know."
"And we've lost our tags," laughed Jim faintly.
Agatha couldn't resist the laugh, though the weakness in Jim's voice
was almost enough to make her weep as well.
"Yes, we've lost our tags, more's the pity. Mr. Hand thinks we're
either on the coast of Maine, of on an island somewhere near the coast.
I myself think it must at least be Nova Scotia, or possibly
Newfoundland. But Hand will find out and be back soon, and then we'll
get away from here and go to some place where we'll all be comfortable."
Agatha stole away, and with much difficulty succeeded in kindling the
fire again. She tended it until a good steady heat spread over the
rocks, and then returned to James. She curled up, half sitting, half
lying, against the rocks.
Clouds had risen during the recent hours, and it was much darker than
the night before had been. The ocean, washing its million pebbles up
on the little beach, moaned and complained incessantly. In the long
intervals between their talk, Agatha's head would fall, her eyes would
close, and she would almost sleep; but an undercurrent of anxiety
concerning her companion kept her always at the edge of consciousness.
James himself appeared to have no desire to sleep. He was trying to
piece together, in his mind, his conscious and unconscious memories.
At last he said:
"I guess I haven't been much good--for a while--have I?"
Agatha considered before replying. "You were quite exhausted, I think;
and we feared you might be ill."
"And Handy Andy got my job?" She laughed outright at this, as much for
the feeling of reassurance it gave her as for the jest itself.
"Handy Andy certainly _had_ a job, with us two on his hands!" she
laughed.
"I bet he did!" cried James, with more vigor than he had shown before.
"He's a great man; I'm for him! When's he coming back?"
"Early in the morning, I hope," said Agatha, swallowing her misgivings.
"That's good," said James. "I think I'll be about and good for
something myself by that time."
There was another long pause, so long that Agatha thought James must
have gone to sleep again. He thought likewise of her, it appeared; for
when he next spoke it was in a careful whisper:
"Are you still awake, Agatha Redmond?"
"Yes, indeed; quite. Do you want anything?"
"Yes, a number of things. First, are you quite recovered from the
trouble--that night's awful trouble?" He seemed to be wholly lost as
to time. "Did you come off without any serious injury? Do you look
like yourself, strong and rosy-cheeked again?"
Agatha replied heartily to this, and her answer appeared to satisfy
James for the moment. "Though," she added, "here in the dark, who can
tell whether I have rosy cheeks or not?"
"True!" sighed James, but his sigh was not an unhappy one. Presently
he began once more: "I want to know, too, if you weren't surprised that
I knew your name?"
"Well, yes, a little, when I had time to think about it. How _did_ you
know it?"
James laughed. "I meant to keep it a secret, always; but I guess I'll
tell, after all--just you. I got it from the program, that Sunday, you
know."
"Ah, yes, I understand." She didn't quite understand, at first; for
there had been other Sundays and other songs. But she could not weary
him now with questions.
As they lay there the slow, monotonous susurrus of the sea made a deep
accompaniment to their words. It was near, and yet immeasurably far,
filling the universe with its soft but insistent sound and echoes of
sound. At the back of her mind, Agatha heard it always, low,
threatening, and strong; but on the surface of her thoughts, she was
trying to decide what she ought to do. She was thinking whether she
might question her companion a little concerning himself, when he
answered her, in part, of his own accord.
"You couldn't know who I am, of course: James Hambleton, of Lynn. Jim,
Jimmy, Jimsy, Bud--I'm called most anything. But I wanted to tell
you--in fact, that's what I waked up expressly for--I wanted to tell
you--"
He paused so long, that Agatha leaned over, trying to see his face.
The violence of the chill had passed. His eyes were wide open, his
face alarmingly pale. She felt a sudden qualm of pain, lest illness
and exhaustion had wrought havoc in his frame deeper than she knew.
But as she bent over him, his features lighted up with his rare
smile--an expression full of happiness and peace. He lifted a hand,
feebly, and she took it in both her own. She felt that thus, hand in
hand, they were nearer; that thus she could better be of help to him.
"I wanted to tell you," he began again, "that whatever happens, I'm
glad I did it."
"Did what, dear friend?" questioned Agatha, thinking in her heart that
the fever had set his wits to wandering.
"Glad I followed the Face and the Voice," he answered feebly. Agatha
watched him closely, torn with anxiety. She couldn't bear to see him
suffer--this man who had so suddenly become a friend, who had been so
brave and unselfish for her sake, who had been so cheerful throughout
their night of trouble.
"I told old Aleck," James went on, "that I'd have to jump the fence;
but that was ages ago. I've been harnessed down so long, that I
thought I'd gone to sleep, sure enough." Agatha thought certainly that
now he was delirious, but she had no heart to stop his gentle
earnestness. He went on: "But you woke me up. And I wouldn't have
missed this last run, not for anything. 'Twas a great night, that
night on the water, with you; and whatever happens, I shall always
think _that_ worth living for; yes, well worth living for."
James's voice died away into incoherence and at last into silence.
Agatha, holding his hands in hers, watched him as he sank away from her
into some realm whither she could not follow. Either his hour of
sanity and calmness had passed, and fever had taken hold upon his
system; or fatigue, mental and physical, had overpowered him once more.
Presently she dropped his hand gently, looked to the coverings of his
couch, and settled herself down again to rest.
But no more sleep came to her eyes that night. She thought over all
that James had said, remembering his words vividly. Then her thoughts
went back over the years, recalling she knew not what irrelevant
matters from the past. Perhaps by some underlying law of association,
there came to her mind, also, the words of the song she had sung on the
Sunday which James had referred to--
"Free of my pain, free of my burden of sorrow,
At last I shall see thee--"
What ages it was since she had sung that song! And this man, this
James Hambleton, it appeared, had heard her sing it; and somehow, by
fate, he had been tossed into the same adventure with herself.
Unconsciously, Agatha's generous heart began to swell with pride in
James's strength and courage, with gratitude for his goodness to her,
and with an almost motherly pity for his present plight. She would
admit no more than that; but that, she thought, bound her to him by
ties that would never break. He would always be different to her, by
reason of that night and what she chose to term his splendid heroism.
She had seen him in his hour of strength, that hour when the overman
makes half-gods out of mortals. It was the heart of youth, plus the
endurance of the man, that had saved them both. It had been a call to
action, dauntlessly answered, and he himself had avowed that the
struggle, the effort, even the final pain, were "worth living for!"
Thinking of his white face and feeble voice, she prayed that the high
gods might not regard them worth dying for.