Next morning 'Mandy went back with me to my room. There was no one in
it. For a moment the thought came to me that perhaps I had suffered
from a nightmare. My clothes, everything, I found exactly as I had left
them. I went over to the door opening from my room into the laboratory,
and then I knew that I had not erred: the door was unlocked. I saw
'Mandy watching me, and I think she guessed the truth, for she said:
"You needn't be 'fraid no more, chile. I goin' to sleep with you every
night now."
"No, 'Mandy," I said; "I can't stay here now. I've got to get away
somehow."
"Dat's all right, chile," she said. "Jus' you tek you li'l' bag and
slip out right now. No one's stirring in dis house yet. You won't be
missed till after you sure am gone."
I was sitting on the side of the bed, feverishly turning the matter
over in my mind.
"I wish I could do that," I said, "but I have no place to go, and I
have no money."
'Mandy comforted me as best she could, and told me to wait till after
breakfast, when I'd feel better; then I could talk to the doctor about
it, and perhaps he'd give me some money; and if he wouldn't, said the
colored girl, shrewdly, "you tell him you goin' ask his wife."
I felt I could not do that. I would have to find some other solution.
One thing was certain, however, I could no more stay here than I could
in Jamaica. There are times in my life when I have been whipped and
scorched, and nothing has healed me save to get away quickly from the
place where I have suffered. I felt like that in Jamaica. I felt like
that now. There came another time in my life when I uprooted my whole
being from a place I loved, and yet where it would have killed me to
remain.
The doctor met me in the lower hall as I came down-stairs. His manner
was affable and formal, and he said he would take me to his wife. I
found myself unable to look him in the face, for I felt his glance
would be hateful.
Mrs. Manning was in bed, propped up with pillows. At first glance she
seemed an old woman. Her pale, parched face lay like a shadow among her
pillows, and her fine, silvery hair was like an exquisite aureole. She
had dark, restless, seeking eyes, and her expression was peevish, like
that of a complaining child. As I came in, she raised herself to her
elbow, and looked curiously at me and then at the doctor, who said:
"This is Miss Ascough, dear. She is to be my new secretary."
She put out a thin little hand, which I took impetuously in my
own, and, I know not why, I suddenly wanted to cry again. There
was something in her glance that hurt me. I had for her that same
overwhelming pity that I had felt for Miss Foster in Jamaica--a pity
such as one involuntarily feels toward one who is doomed. She murmured
something, and I said, "Thank you," though I did not understand what
she had said. Then the doctor shook up her pillows and settled her back
very carefully among them, and he kissed her, and she clung to him. I
realized that, incredible as it seemed, here where I had expected it
least there was love.
After breakfast, which I had with the doctor, who read the morning
paper throughout the meal, waited on by 'Mandy, he took me down to his
offices, two large adjoining rooms on the ground floor, in one wing
of the house. One room was used as a reception-room, the other as the
doctor's own. Showing me through the offices, he had indicated the
desk at which I was to sit in the reception-room before I summoned the
courage to tell him I had decided to go. When I faltered this out,
he turned clear around, and although an exclamation of astonishment
escaped him, I knew that he was acting. I felt sure that he had been
waiting for me to say something about the previous night.
"You certainly cannot realize what you are saying, Miss Ascough. Why
should you leave a position before trying it?"
I looked steadily in his face now, and I was no longer afraid of him.
I was only an ignorant girl of seventeen, and he was a man of the
world past forty. I was friendless, had no money, and was in a strange
country. He was a man of power, and, I suppose, even wealth. This was
the city where he was respected and known. Nevertheless, I said to him:
"If I work for a man, I expect to be paid for my actual labor. That's a
contract between us. After that, I have my personal rights, and no man
can step over these without my consent."
They were pretty big words for a young girl, and I am proud of them
even now. I can see myself as I faced that man defiantly, though I knew
I had barely enough money in my purse upstairs to buy a few meals.
"I do not understand you," said the doctor, pulling at his beard. "I
shall be obliged if you will make yourself clearer."
"I will, then," I said. "Last night you came into my room."
For a long time he did not say a word, but appeared to be considering
the matter.
"I beg your pardon for that," he said at last, "but I think my
explanation will satisfy you. I did not know that that room was the one
my wife had assigned to you. I had been accustomed to occupy it myself
when engaged at night upon laboratory work. I was as mortified as you
when I discovered my unfortunate mistake last night, and I very much
regret the distress it gave you."
No explanation could have been clearer than that, but looking at the
man, I felt a deep-rooted conviction that he lied.
"Come now," he said cheerfully, "suppose we dismiss this painful
subject. Let us both forget it." He held out his hand, with one of his
"fatherly" smiles. I reluctantly let him take mine, and I did not know
what to do or say. He took out his watch and looked at it.
"I have a number of calls to make before my noon hour," he said, "but I
think I can spare an hour to explain your duties to you."
They were simple enough, and in other circumstances I should have liked
such a position. I was to receive the patients, send out bills, and
answer the correspondence, which was light. I had one other duty, and
that he asked me to do now. There was something wrong with his eyes,
and it was a strain upon them for him to read. So part of my work was
to read to him an hour in the morning and one or two in the evening.
There was a long couch in the inner office, and after he had selected
a book and brought it to me, he lay down on the couch, with a green
shade over his eyes, and bade me proceed. The book was Rousseau's
"Confessions."
In ordinary circumstances the book would have held my interest at
once, but now I read it without the slightest sense of understanding,
and the powerful sentences came forth from my lips, but passed through
heedless ears. I had read only two chapters when he said that that
would do for to-day. He asked me to bring from the top of his desk a
glass in which was some fluid and an eye-dropper. He requested me to
put two drops in each of his eyes.
As he was lying on his back on the couch, I had to lean over him to do
this. I was so nervous that the glass shook in my hand. Judge of my
horror when, in squeezing the little rubber bulb, the glass part fell
off and dropped down upon his face.
I burst out crying, and before I knew it, he was sitting up on the
couch and comforting me, with his arms about my waist. I freed myself
and stood up. He said:
"There, there, you are a bit hysterical this morning. You'll feel
better later."
He began moving about the office, collecting some things, and putting
them into a little black bag. Toby knocked, and called that the buggy
was ready. As the doctor was drawing on his gloves he said:
"Now, Miss Ascough, suppose you make an effort to--er accustom yourself
to things as they are here. I'm really not such a bad sort as you
imagine, and I will try to make you very comfortable and happy if you
will let me."
I did not answer him. I sat there twisting my handkerchief in my
hands, and feeling dully that I was truly the most miserable girl in
the world. As the doctor was going out, he said:
"Do cheer up! Things are not nearly as bad as they seem."
Maybe they were not, but, nevertheless, the stubborn obsession
persisted in my mind that I must somehow get away from that place. How
I was going to do that without money or friends, I did not know. And if
I did leave this place, where could I go?
I thought of writing home, and then, even in my distress, I thought of
papa, absent-minded, impractical dreamer. Could I make him understand
the situation I was in without telling him my actual experience? I felt
a reluctance to tell my father or mother that. It's a fact that a young
girl will often talk with strangers about things that she will hesitate
to confide to her own parents. My parents were of the sort difficult to
approach in such a matter. You see, I was one of many, and my father
and mother were in a way even more helpless than their children. It was
almost pathetic the way in which they looked to us, as we grew up, to
take care of ourselves and them. Besides, it would take two days for a
letter to reach my home, and another two days for the reply to reach
me, and where could my poor father raise the money for my fare? No, I
would not add to their distresses.
I went up to my room, after the doctor was gone, and I aimlessly
counted my money. I had less than three dollars. I was putting it back
into my bag, with the papers, trinkets, cards, and the other queer
things that congregate in a girl's pocketbook, when Mr. Hamilton's card
turned up on my lap.
I began to think of him. I sat there on the side of my bed in a sort
of dreaming trance, recalling to my mind that charmed little journey
in the company of this man. Every word he had said to me, the musing
expression of his face, and his curious, grudging smile--I thought of
all this. It was queer how in the midst of my trouble I could occupy
my mind like this with thoughts of a stranger. I remembered that Dr.
Manning had said he was a notorious man. I did not believe that. I
thought of that kindly look of interest in his tired face when he had
asked me if I wanted to go to school, and then electrically recurred to
me his last words on the train when he had given to me his card,--that
if I ever needed help, would I come to him?
I needed help now. I needed it more than any girl ever needed it
before. Of that I felt truly convinced. This doctor was a villain.
There was something bad and covetous about his very glance. I had felt
that in Jamaica. It was impossible for me to remain alone with him
in his house; for I should be virtually alone, since his wife was a
paralytic.
Hurriedly I packed my things, shoving everything back into my
suitcase, and then I put on my hat. In the doctor's office I found the
telephone-book. I looked up the name of Hamilton. Yes, it was there.
It seemed to me a miraculous thing that he really was there in that
telephone-book and that he actually was in this city.
I called the number, and somebody, answering, asked whom I wished to
speak to, and I said Mr. Roger Avery Hamilton.
"Who is it wants him?" I was asked.
"Just a friend," I replied.
"You will have to give your name. Mr. Hamilton is in a conference, and
if it is not important, he cannot speak to you just now."
"It is important," I said. "He would want to speak to me, I know."
There was a long pause, and central asked me if I was through, and I
said frantically:
"No, no; don't ring off."
Then a moment later I heard his voice, and even over the telephone it
thrilled me so that I could have wept with relief and joy.
"Yes?"
"Mr. Hamilton, this is Miss Ascough."
"Miss Ascough?"
"Yes; I met you on the train coming from Boston."
"Oh, yes, the little girl with the dog," he said.
His voice, more than his words, warmed me with the thought that he had
not forgotten me, and was even pleased to hear from me again.
"You said if I ever needed help--"