Jap threw his pencil impatiently on the desk.
"I can't get my thoughts running clear this morning," he said abruptly.
"Every time I try to write, the pale face of little J. W. comes between
me and the page."
"They're back from the city," Bill said uneasily. "I saw them coming
from the train. I fully meant to tell you, Jap."
"I hope the specialist has quieted Flossy's fears." Jap ran his
fingers through his loose red locks. "The boy is growing too fast.
Why, look at the way he has shot up in the last year. Ellis told me
that he ran up like a bean pole, the way I did, and just as thin. J.
W. is exactly like him."
"And Ellis died at forty----"
"Don't, Bill," Jap choked. "I can't bear it." He walked to the door
and gazed out into the hazy silver autumn air.
"This weather is like wine," he declared. "It will set the boy up,
fine as a fiddle. You must remember, Bill, that Ellis impoverished his
system by the life of hardship he was forced to endure while the town
was growing. The things he used to tell were humorous enough, the
droll way he had of telling them. But they break our hearts when we
think of them now, and know that it was that privation that killed him.
It was bad enough here when I was a youngster, and that was luxury to
what he had had. J. W. has not had such a handicap. Of course he was
a delicate baby, but he certainly outgrew all that."
Bill was discreetly silent. He knew that Jap was only arguing with his
fears. In the early summer, J. W. had been acutely ill, and as the
heat progressed, he languished with headache and fever. In the end,
Dr. Hall had counselled taking him to a noted specialist in the city.
"Better take a run up to Flossy's," Bill suggested. "You'll be better
satisfied."
Jap took a copy of the _Herald_ from the table and went out. All the
way along Spring street he strove with his anxiety. Flossy met him on
the porch. One glance was enough for Jap. He sat down, helpless, on
the lower step.
"J. W. is tired out and asleep," said Flossy softly. "Come with me,
Jap, down to the arbor. You remember the day that Ellis told you the
truth about himself?"
Jap followed her beneath the grape trellis, stumbling clumsily. When
they reached the arbor, with its bench and rustic table, she faced him,
slender to attenuation.
"Jap," she said brokenly, "J. W. has tuberculosis in the worst form.
His entire body is filled with it. He contracted it while we were with
Ellis--and we never knew, never suspected----" Her voice broke. "Not
even a miracle can prolong his life longer than spring. The doctors
insisted on examining me, too. They say I have it, in incipiency, and
my only chance of escape is to leave my boy to the care of others.
Under the right conditions they say I have a fighting chance."
"You are sure that you have every advice?" Jap's voice was so hoarse
that she looked up at him in alarm.
"Yes, Jap, but I knew it before. Months ago, even before he was so
sick in the summer, I had a dream, and this was my dream: Ellis, with
that beautiful smile that every one loved, was waiting out there at the
gate, and I was hurrying to get the boy ready to go with him. I knew,
when I awoke, that he was ready to wait our boy's coming. Oh, Jap, do
you think that smile was for me, too?"
The look of agony in Jap's sensitive face was more than she could bear.
She clutched his arm.
"Oh, Jap, pray--help me to pray that he was waiting for me, too. The
time has been so long. I want to be with my boy to the last. You
understand, Jap. I don't believe that words are needed."
He put his arms around her. He could not speak, but his head bent
above hers and the hot tears dropped upon her brown hair, now streaked
with gray.
"I have done the work he wanted me to do," she sobbed. "He wanted me
to be a mother until you were on the plane he had planned. Like the
butterfly whose day is done, Jap, I would go. I am so tired, and--boy,
I have never ceased to long for Ellis. The world could not supply
another soul like his."
"Flossy," Jap said in smothered tones, "I know. I have walked the
floor for hours, missing him until I was almost frantic. But, little
Mother, what is left to me if you go? Without you, I am drifting
again."
"I would fear that, if I had never seen into the deeps of Isabel's
nature. And to think that I once decried--but I didn't understand,
Jap. When your mother came, there was a revelation. I don't fear for
your future now. And when I knew this, I suddenly felt tired and old.
I pray not to survive my boy."
The following morning brought the first fall rain. And then, for
endless weeks, the leaden sky drooped over the world. Dreary
depression and the penetrating chill of approaching winter filled the
air. Only the unwonted pressure of work kept the boys from brooding
over the inevitable that would come with the spring-time. To relieve
Flossy of all unnecessary burdens, Jap and Bill went to the hotel for
their meals, but every evening one or the other went to sit with her.
At length there came a time, late in November, when the office work was
more than both of them could handle, and for several days the visits
were interrupted.
"Flossy is sick," announced Bill, hanging his dripping raincoat behind
the door. "I saw Pap just now, and he told me. He and his wife were
there all night. He says that J. W. has been so bad off for a week,
has had such bad spells at night, that Flossy has hardly slept, and
yesterday she broke down and sent for Pap. He took Doc Hall along, and
they are afraid she has pneumonia."
Jap threw his paper aside.
"Why didn't we know that J. W. was worse?" he demanded. "I sent some
one to inquire every morning while we had the big rush on, and Flossy
said that they were all right. I thought that she was going to take
him to the mountains."
"I guess that she didn't know how sick he was," commented Bill. "Pap
was to haul the trunks to-morrow, as Flossy told us. She wanted to
start on Sunday so that you and I could go as far as Cliffton with her.
She knew we were working overtime to get things cleaned up."
Jap put on his raincoat, for it was pouring a deluge.
"I will not be back if Flossy needs me," he said.
For three days and nights he hovered over the two sick-beds, while the
wind soughed mournfully around the cottage, and the rain dripped,
dripped, dripped, like tears against the wall outside. Neighbors and
friends volunteered their services. Bill and Isabel came as often as
was possible; but when all the others had gone, Jap kept his solemn
vigil alone. On the afternoon of the fourth day, there was a sudden
turn for the worse. Dr. Hall was hastily summoned. And then, all at
once, without any seeming warning, it happened.
The last gasping breath faded from the body of Ellis's child, and as
Jap leaned over to close the wide, staring eyes, he could hear the
rasping breaths that rent Flossy's bosom, as she lay unconscious in the
next room.
"With God's help we may pull her through," whispered Isabel, twining
her arms around his neck. He turned stony eyes of grief upon her.
"If God helps, He will let her go with J. W. to meet Ellis," he said in
a voice strained to breaking.
He drew the girl from the chamber of death, and sat down beside
Flossy's bed. He caught one fluttering, fever-burned hand in his, and
the restless muttering ceased. Then the eyes opened. They seemed to
be looking not at Jap but above him.
"Ellis!" she cried, and slept.
"When she awakes, she will be better or----" Dr. Hall broke off, and
went over to the window. "It's the crisis," he finished huskily.
Flossy, in her quiet, optimistic bravery, had made her place in the
hearts of her townspeople. Isabel knelt beside her, watching Jap's
face, with its unnatural calm, fearfully. She dared not speak. Bill
stood awkwardly at the foot of the bed, his cap twirling uncertainly in
his hand. His eyes shifted uneasily from the thin, white face on the
pillow to the frozen features of Jap. A clock ticked loudly.
The thick gloom broke. A tiny linnet that Jap had given Flossy
fluttered to the swing in its cage and burst, all at once, into song,
and a vagrant sunbeam darted through the western clouds. Flossy opened
her eyes.
"Jap," she gasped painfully, "is this the thing called Death, this
uplift of joy?"
The doctor raised her in his arms and gave her a few sips of medicine.
She was easier. She motioned Jap to bend closer.
"Is he gone?" she asked clearly. "Is my boy with his father?"
Jap kissed her forehead gently.
"He is with Ellis," he whispered.
"Then I thank You, great Giver of all Good," she cried happily, "for I
can go now." She summoned Bill with her eyes.
"I want you to make the boy very proud of the men he was named for,"
she smiled. It was a smile of heavenly beauty, as the pure soul of
Ellis Hinton's wife flew to join her loved ones.