There is always the awakening, the coming back once more to
consciousness, to the world that has been, and must endure, but will
never again be as it was. Adelle woke to consciousness in the orangery,
where they had laid mattresses for her and the dead child. Through the
open door she might see the blackened walls of what had been Highcourt.
The fire had swept clear through the three parts, scorching even the
eucalyptus trees above on the hillside, and had died out at last for
lack of food. The debris was now smouldering sullenly in the cloudless,
windless day that had succeeded the storm. All the beauty of an early
spring morning in California rioted outside, insulting the bereaved
woman with its refreshment and joy. It was on mornings like this after a
storm that Adelle loved the place most. She would take "Boy" and ramble
through the fragrant paths. For then Nature, like a human being, having
thrown off its evil mood, tries by caresses and sweet smiles to win
favor again....
Adelle lay there this golden morning, one arm around the little figure
of her dead child, staring at the pool outside which was dappled with
sunshine, at the ghastly wreck of her great house--not thinking, perhaps
not even feeling acutely--aware merely of living in a void, the
shattered fragments of her old being all around her. How long she might
have lain there one cannot tell: she felt that she should be like this
always, numbed in the presence of life and light. They brought her food
and clothes, and said things to her. Archie came in and sat down on one
of the upturned flower-pots. He was fully dressed now, but still looked
shaken, bewildered, a little cowed, as if he could not understand. At
sight of him Adelle remembered the night, remembered the shaking, feeble
figure of her husband, trying to get his arm into the sleeve of his
dress-coat, useless before the tragedy, useless in the face of life.
"What can I do!" he had whined then. Adelle could not then realize that
she had made him as he was and should be merciful. She was filled with a
physical loathing, a spiritual weariness of him, and turned her face to
the wall so that she might not even see him.
"Adelle," he said. There was no reply. "Dell, dear," he began again, and
put his hand coaxingly upon her shoulder.
She sat up, looking like a fierce animal, her hair tumbled about her
neck and breasts, her pale face drawn and haggard. "Don't touch
me--don't speak to me!" she whispered hoarsely. "Never again!"
She threw into those last words an intensity, a weight of meaning that
startled even Archie, who whimpered out,--"It wasn't my fault!"
Adelle neither knew nor cared then what had caused the fire. It was
stupid of Archie to understand her so badly--she was not blaming him for
the fire. She turned her face again to the wall, but suddenly, as if a
light had struck through her blurred and blunted consciousness of the
world, she called,--
"I want to see him--Clark, the mason;--tell him to come here to see me!"
Archie, crestfallen, sneaked out of the orangery on her errand. After a
time he returned with the young mason, who stumbled into the dark room.
Clark was washed and his cut had been bandaged, but he showed the
terrible strain of those few minutes on the wall. His face twitched and
his large hands opened and closed nervously. He looked pityingly at
Adelle and mumbled,--
"Sorry I was too late!"
That was all. Adelle made a gesture as if to say that it was useless to
use words over it. She did not thank him. She looked at him out of her
gray eyes, now miserable with pain. She felt a great relief at seeing
him, a curious return of her old interest in his simple, native strength
and nerve, his personality. It made her feel more like herself to have
him there and to know that he was sorry for her. After one or two
attempts to find her voice she said clearly,--
"I must tell you something.... I thought of telling you about it before,
but I couldn't. I thought there were reasons not to. But now I must tell
you before you go."
"Don't trouble yourself now, ma'am," the mason said gently. "I guess
it'll keep until you're feelin' stronger."
"No, no, I can't wait. I must tell you now!" She raised herself with
effort and leaned her thin face upon her hands. "I want him"--she
pointed to Archie--"to hear it, too."
Then she tried again to collect her mind, to phrase what she had to say
in the clearest possible way.
"Half of my money belongs to you, Mr. Clark."
The two men must have thought that her reason had left her after the
terrible night, but she soon made her meaning clear.
"I didn't know it until a little while ago when I found out from those
letters who you were. Not even then, just afterwards. Clark's Field was
left to your grandfather and mine together, and somehow I got the whole
of it--I mean I did from my mother and uncle. The lawyers can tell you
all about it. Only it's really half yours--half of all there was!"
Archie now began to comprehend that his wife referred to the old legal
difficulty over the title to Clark's Field, and interposed.
"You'd better wait, dear, until you are stronger before you try to think
about business."
But Adelle utterly ignored him, as she was to do henceforth, and
addressed herself singly to her cousin.
"I always thought it was all mine--they said it was. And when I knew
about you, I didn't want to give it up; there isn't as much as there was
because he has lost a good deal. But that makes no difference. Half of
the whole belongs to you and your brothers and sisters. I'll see that
you get it. That's all!"
She lay back exhausted.