A FRIEND IN NEED
When Margaret woke next morning it was with a bewildered sense of
something wrong,--the dull ache we have in the gray dawn before
returning consciousness brings it all back to us, and makes it a sharp
pain. Then, as the events of the night before came back, and the dread
of to-day forced itself upon her, she closed her eyes in a sick longing
to go to sleep and never wake.
This was the end! They had had words, bitter words, before--but never
like this. How could she forget his cruel thrusts, his broken faith,
which he had even flaunted in her face? How could the barrier between
them which her passionate challenge had raised be broken down? "She must
be all or nothing." Yes, and it was true! as true to-day as it was
yesterday and would be for all time. Only his hand could break that
barrier down. And suppose he would not.... Well! so be it. It seemed to
her that her heart was numbed and could never be warmed into life again.
There rose before her a picture she had seen one day--a man with
wretched face, a woman who had cast herself on a couch in an attitude
suggesting the abandon of despair, and between them on the table a still
form that she thought at first glance was their dead baby, only that she
saw the wings and knew that it was Love--dead Love.
It was very late when she had gone to bed the night before, and still
Victor had not come. She had fallen immediately into the deep sleep of
exhaustion which comes to us sometimes when a crisis is past, even
though it has brought the worst. Women who hang sleepless and wide-eyed
over a sick-bed have been known to fall into a sleep like that of death,
when all is over, their wild grief swallowed up in nature's merciful
oblivion. So it had been with Margaret.
Had he come in while she slept? She stepped to her husband's door and
peeped cautiously in. The bed was undisturbed. She went back to her own
room and stood there shaking as with an ague. What did it mean?
Then she sat down and thought--thought deeply--going over all the
wretched quarrel,--trying to judge between them, to see where--if
anywhere--he was right and she was wrong. She had been passionate--yes,
and had said bitter things. But they were true! And, she told herself
despairingly, it was not the things they _said_! The trouble lay back of
that.... If only it had been something else! But this! ... oh, how could
she compromise? The words of that odious Mrs. Bomprey came to her--"Men
are naughty creatures, my dear. Wise women learn to shut their eyes!"
"Why must they shut their eyes?" she asked, fiercely. The very
insinuation was dishonoring to both. But--was the woman right?
Were all men like this?... Her soul grew sick. Then--no! no! _no!_ she
told herself in passionate protest--it was not true! She would not
believe this withering, blasting thing. There was her father! Though all
the world should rise up and say there was no truth in men, she still
would know--there was her father!
At breakfast she said, quietly, "Mr. De Jarnette is not at home this
morning. We will not wait. He has been called away and may not be home
for several days." All this with no surprise at her own power to lie
without compunction.
When the meal was over she waited to give directions to the servants, as
usual, speaking cheerfully to all. She could not bear the pity of her
servants. Her maid, a faithful girl, came to her in her room. Could she
let her go home for a while? Her mother was very ill and needed her--she
hated to leave just now, and wouldn't, only--it was her mother. Yes,
Margaret said hastily, feeling with a throb of loneliness that the ties
of blood were to be nourished, not denied. Then when the girl was gone
she felt bereft.
Through that long morning Margaret waited. The air she breathed was dead
and deadening; she gasped sometimes for breath. It was the close,
oppressive air that presages a storm. It seemed to press upon her so.
She went once to the window, expecting, without knowing why, to see the
lightning and to hear the thunder's roll, and felt vague surprise to see
the leaves stirred by the breeze, and over all the sunlight. There was
no storm.
She moved restlessly about her room, putting her drawers to rights with
a strange feeling unformulated even to herself, but pressing hard, that
she must put her house in order, for the end was near.
In the upper hall near her door was the telephone. She went once to it,
took the receiver down, and then returned it to the hook, turning
afterwards resolutely to it and telling herself, "He is my husband. It
certainly is my right to know." Then to the one who answered, she said,
brightly, "Will you please ask Mr. De Jarnette to come to the 'phone?"
She would not ask if he was there. To her excited imagination that would
seem to imply that she did not know of his whereabouts.
The answer came.
"Is that you, Mrs. De Jarnette? Good morning, madam.... Why, ... Mr. De
Jarnette hasn't come in yet. Probably somebody stopped him on the way
down.... Yes.... Well, I will tell him when he comes in. Good-by."
Margaret looked at the clock. It was after eleven. She sat down faint
and trembling. He had not been to the office.
Soon after this Judge Kirtley called to see her on some matter of
business. He asked her casually about Victor, and she answered with a
smile and a steady voice, feeling all the time that if he said another
word she must go to him and fall upon his breast and cry aloud.
Then--was she pretty well? Ah, that was good.... No, Mrs. Kirtley was in
bed with grippe. The doctor said he should keep her there a good
while.... Well, she must take good care of herself--patting her
cheek--and--good-by.
When he was gone, Margaret had an insane desire to scream. It seemed to
her that everybody was leaving her.... Where was Victor?
At two o'clock Richard De Jarnette came. He found her in the library.
With that strange restlessness and presentiment of coming ill which
possessed her, she was looking over papers in her desk and putting
things in place. A waste basket beside her was half filled with old
letters. From the drawer just emptied she had taken a revolver of
peculiar workmanship. It was one belonging to her husband, which he had
left in the desk. She was taking it up with the intention of carrying it
to his room, but when the servant announced Mr. De Jarnette, she laid it
hastily on the top of the desk and put the drawer back. When she rose to
meet her brother-in-law she took hold of the desk to steady herself, for
she had a feeling that this visit was upon no trifling errand. As she
did so her hand touched the revolver, and she drew back.
"It is Victor's," she said, "I was putting it away."
He looked at the revolver, taking in as people do sometimes in the
crises of their lives the details of its curious workmanship.
He wasted no time in formalities. He had come to ask her about Victor.
Did she know anything about him--where he was?
No. She did not know he had gone away. She was controlling herself by so
strong an effect that her voice sounded hard. Where was he? Had any
message come from him?
Richard De Jarnette had not had much experience in dealing with women.
He took from his pocket a telegram and handed it to her. It was dated
New York. She held it with unsteady hand and read:
"Wire me two thousand dollars--Paris--Credit Lyonnais. Sail
to-night.
Victor De Jarnette."
She grew white as the dead.
"You knew nothing of this?" he asked.
"Nothing."
"And can you give me no idea of what it means?" His voice was tense, so
much so that it had the unfortunate effect of making his words sound
severe.
Margaret stared at the paper, feeling the earth sway beneath her feet.
"No--unless--perhaps I ought to tell you that--we quarreled last
night--a bitter quarrel--"
"Quarreled? About what?" He spoke sharply.
She lifted her head at that and looked full at him.
"About something that concerns only ourselves, I think."
"I beg your pardon. You are quite right. I did not mean to intrude, but
only to find out if I could the meaning of this incomprehensible thing.
I beg you to believe that I would like to serve you."
"Of course this will be known," she said, hesitatingly. "If--if it could
be kept out of the papers I should be glad. It would only avert
publicity for a little while--but--I might be stronger then to bear it."
"I will see to it at once. The papers will say, if you desire, that he
has been called away on urgent business."
"Oh, yes, if you will be so good. I think--I hope--and still I do not
know that it can ever be arranged."
As he rose to go he said after an awkward silence, "I seem unfortunate
in my questions, but I hope you will not misunderstand me. Has he left
you money?"
"Oh, I have money, yes. All I need. I do not misunderstand. You--you are
very kind."
He bowed gravely. Then, after another silence, "Of course you know that
this will mean quite an absence from home, even if he should turn around
and come back as soon as he reaches the other shore." He was adding
savagely to himself, "As he will when he hears from me."
"Yes, I know," murmured Margaret, faintly.
"Have you not some elderly friend that you could have with you for a
while? I am sure Victor has gone off only in a spirit of pique. He was
always impulsive and headstrong. If you could ask some such person--"
She shook her head.
"I am very much alone," she said. Her childish helplessness would have
touched a stone. "You see I have no relatives. And Mrs. Kirtley (I am
sure she would have come) is ill." She was twisting the telegram with
nervous fingers, feeling again that mad desire to scream. She felt sure
she would do so if he spoke another sympathetic word.
He turned his eyes away. "I really think you should have some older
woman with you, other than your maid--just now."
"My maid is gone," she said, a lump rising in her throat--repeating,
"It--leaves me--very much alone."
"That settles it," he said. "I shall send my housekeeper to you from
Elmhurst. She is reliable and kind. You can depend upon her fully. She
has always lived with us, and there is nothing she likes so well as to
mother people."
Her chin quivered like a child's. "I--I think I _need_ mothering," she
said.
He beat a hasty retreat. Her helplessness wrung his heart.
* * * * *
Two hours later Mammy Cely presented herself before Margaret--rotund of
figure, dark and shining of face, thick-lipped and flat-nosed. But in
her kind eyes was the brooding spirit of motherhood. Mammy Cely was of
the old school. As she stood there in her clean dark gingham, white
apron, white head handkerchief, and a three-cornered piece of like
immaculateness crossing her breast, she was the embodiment of a past
civilization, an archaic reminder of the old régime which everybody
condemns, which nobody wants revived, but which has its sacred memories
of friendships between high and low, that come, as all memories do, only
to those who have experienced in the far past that for which the memory
stands. To Margaret this humble friend was a gift from Heaven.
But all this time Mammy Cely was unobtrusively taking in the situation.
"That child's done stood all she ken now," she was saying to herself.
"Pretty soon she gwineter break down--that she is!" Aloud she remarked,
respectfully, "Yaas, 'm, 'tis mighty bad 'bout Mr. Victor bein' called
away right now. Marse Richard was tellin' me about it.... But _nem_mine,
honey, we gwineter s'prise him when he gits home, ain't we? We gwineter
have the party all over and ever'body gone home but us and de li'l'
gen'l'man." She was talking to her as one speaks to a frightened child.
"There!... There!... Mammy Cely gwineter take keer of you, honey! Don't
you be skeered. She done tuk keer of a heap er ladies in her day. She
knows jes' what to do. You needn't to worry. She gwineter stay right
here.... Yo' maid gone too? Well, I do say! These here triflin'
Washington niggers ain't no 'count. _No_ 'm, they ain't! Well,
_nem_mine! I gwineter be yo' maid now--Marse Richard say so--and yo'
mammy too. Then befo' I go away I'll git you somebody ef I has to peruse
this town. Yaas, 'm, I will so! I wouldn't stand, honey. Set down now."
She asked the frightened girl a few questions, putting in a running
commentary of soothing, confidence-inspiring remarks, and Margaret found
herself settling down in profound relief upon the broad foundation of
her practical knowledge.
"And you got all the little clo's ready?... Well, I do say! Ain't they
scrumptious! Humph! Jes' look at the 'shorance of them little shearts!
Honey, they look lak they was holdin' out they arms for a man!... But I
declar this here highfalutin' lacy skeart do sho'ly belong to a little
lady! Well, whichever it is, honey, it's gwineter be yourn, and when you
feel that little chile on yo' breas' and hol' them little hands in
yourn, you gwineter furgit all 'bout the pain and the sufferin'--and the
loneliness--"
The rain clouds had been gathering all day. They could be held back no
longer. Slowly, drops began to fall--the big portentous ones that come
before the storm. If this new maid had come in cold and business-like
she could have withstood it, but this was the mother-note she had always
lacked in her life song. A convulsive sob broke from her overburdened
heart, hearing which and recognizing the futility of further words,
Mammy Cely opened her arms.
"Come here, lamb!"
And Margaret fell, weeping, into them.
* * * * *
That night she went down into the valley of the shadow of death, and the
black woman was her rod and staff.