and our shoes outside the door, a thick carpet on the floor of the room,
outside the windows the rain falling and in the room light and pleasant
and cheerful, then the light out and it exciting with smooth sheets and
the bed comfortable, feeling that we had come home, feeling no longer
alone, waking in the night to find the other one there, and not gone
away; all other things were unreal. We slept when we were tired and if
we woke the other one woke too so one was not alone. Often a man wishes
to be alone and a girl wishes to be alone too and if they love each
other they are jealous of that in each other, but I can truly say we
never felt that. We could feel alone when we were together, alone
against the others. It has only happened to me like that once. I have
been alone while I was with many girls and that is the way that you can
be most lonely. But we were never lonely and never afraid when we were
together. I know that the night is not the same as the day: that all
things are different, that the things of the night cannot be explained
in the day, because they do not then exist, and the night can be a
dreadful time for lonely people once their loneliness has started. But
with Catherine there was almost no difference in the night except that
it was an even better time. If people bring so much courage to this
world the world has to kill them to break them, so of course it kills
them. The world breaks every one and afterward many are strong at the
broken places. But those that will not break it kills. It kills the very
good and the very gentle and the very brave impartially. If you are none
of these you can be sure it will kill you too but there will be no
special hurry.
I remember waking in the morning. Catherine was asleep and the sunlight
was coming in through the window. The rain had stopped and I stepped out
of bed and across the floor to the window. Down below were the gardens,
bare now but beautifully regular, the gravel paths, the trees, the stone
wall by the lake and the lake in the sunlight with the mountains beyond.
I stood at the window looking out and when I turned away I saw Catherine
was awake and watching me.
“How are you, darling?” she said. “Isn’t it a lovely day?”
“How do you feel?”
“I feel very well. We had a lovely night.”
“Do you want breakfast?”
She wanted breakfast. So did I and we had it in bed, the November
sunlight coming in the window, and the breakfast tray across my lap.
“Don’t you want the paper? You always wanted the paper in the hospital.”
“No,” I said. “I don’t want the paper now.”
“Was it so bad you don’t want even to read about it?”
“I don’t want to read about it.”
“I wish I had been with you so I would know about it too.”
“I’ll tell you about it if I ever get it straight in my head.”
“But won’t they arrest you if they catch you out of uniform?”
“They’ll probably shoot me.”
“Then we’ll not stay here. We’ll get out of the country.”
“I’d thought something of that.”
“We’ll get out. Darling, you shouldn’t take silly chances. Tell me how
did you come from Mestre to Milan?”
“I came on the train. I was in uniform then.”
“Weren’t you in danger then?”
“Not much. I had an old order of movement. I fixed the dates on it in
Mestre.”
“Darling, you’re liable to be arrested here any time. I won’t have it.
It’s silly to do something like that. Where would we be if they took you
off?”
“Let’s not think about it. I’m tired of thinking about it.”
“What would you do if they came to arrest you?”
“Shoot them.”
“You see how silly you are, I won’t let you go out of the hotel until we
leave here.”
“Where are we going to go?”
“Please don’t be that way, darling. We’ll go wherever you say. But
please find some place to go right away.”
“Switzerland is down the lake, we can go there.”
“That will be lovely.”
It was clouding over outside and the lake was darkening.
“I wish we did not always have to live like criminals,” I said.
“Darling, don’t be that way. You haven’t lived like a criminal very
long. And we never live like criminals. We’re going to have a fine
time.”
“I feel like a criminal. I’ve deserted from the army.”
“Darling, _please_ be sensible. It’s not deserting from the army. It’s
only the Italian army.”
I laughed. “You’re a fine girl. Let’s get back into bed. I feel fine in
bed.”
A little while later Catherine said, “You don’t feel like a criminal do
you?”
“No,” I said. “Not when I’m with you.”
“You’re such a silly boy,” she said. “But I’ll look after you. Isn’t it
splendid, darling, that I don’t have any morning-sickness?”
“It’s grand.”
“You don’t appreciate what a fine wife you have. But I don’t care. I’ll
get you some place where they can’t arrest you and then we’ll have a
lovely time.”
“Let’s go there right away.”
“We will, darling. I’ll go any place any time you wish.”
“Let’s not think about anything.”
“All right.”
CHAPTER XXXV
Catherine went along the lake to the little hotel to see Ferguson and I
sat in the bar and read the papers. There were comfortable leather
chairs in the bar and I sat in one of them and read until the barman
came in. The army had not stood at the Tagliamento. They were falling
back to the Piave. I remembered the Piave. The railroad crossed it near
San Dona going up to the front. It was deep and slow there and quite
narrow. Down below there were mosquito marshes and canals. There were
some lovely villas. Once, before the war, going up to Cortina D’Ampezzo
I had gone along it for several hours in the hills. Up there it looked
like a trout stream, flowing swiftly with shallow stretches and pools
under the shadow of the rocks. The road turned off from it at Cadore. I
wondered how the army that was up there would come down. The barman came
in.
“Count Greffi was asking for you,” he said.
“Who?”
“Count Greffi. You remember the old man who was here when you were here
before.”
“Is he here?”
“Yes, he’s here with his niece. I told him you were here. He wants you
to play billiards.”
“Where is he?”
“He’s taking a walk.”
“How is he?”
“He’s younger than ever. He drank three champagne cocktails last night
before dinner.”
“How’s his billiard game?”
“Good. He beat me. When I told him you were here he was very pleased.
There’s nobody here for him to play with.”
Count Greffi was ninety-four years old. He had been a contemporary of
Metternich and was an old man with white hair and mustache and beautiful
manners. He had been in the diplomatic service of both Austria and Italy
and his birthday parties were the great social event of Milan. He was
living to be one hundred years old and played a smoothly fluent game of
billiards that contrasted with his own ninety-four-year-old brittleness.
I had met him when I had been at Stresa once before out of season and
while we played billiards we drank champagne. I thought it was a
splendid custom and he gave me fifteen points in a hundred and beat me.
“Why didn’t you tell me he was here?”
“I forgot it.”
“Who else is here?”
“No one you know. There are only six people altogether.”
“What are you doing now?”
“Nothing.”
“Come on out fishing.”
“I could come for an hour.”
“Come on. Bring the trolling line.”
The barman put on a coat and we went out. We went down and got a boat
and I rowed while the barman sat in the stern and let out the line with
a spinner and a heavy sinker on the end to troll for lake trout. We
rowed along the shore, the barman holding the line in his hand and
giving it occasional jerks forward. Stresa looked very deserted from the
lake. There were the long rows of bare trees, the big hotels and the
closed villas. I rowed across to Isola Bella and went close to the
walls, where the water deepened sharply, and you saw the rock wall
slanting down in the clear water, and then up and along to the
fisherman’s island. The sun was under a cloud and the water was dark and
smooth and very cold. We did not have a strike though we saw some
circles on the water from rising fish.
I rowed up opposite the fisherman’s island where there were boats drawn
up and men were mending nets.
“Should we get a drink?”
“All right.”
I brought the boat up to the stone pier and the barman pulled in the
line, coiling it on the bottom of the boat and hooking the spinner on
the edge of the gunwale. I stepped out and tied the boat. We went into a
little café, sat at a bare wooden table and ordered vermouth.
“Are you tired from rowing?”
“No.”
“I’ll row back,” he said.
“I like to row.”
“Maybe if you hold the line it will change the luck.”
“All right.”
“Tell me how goes the war.”
“Rotten.”
“I don’t have to go. I’m too old, like Count Greffi.”
“Maybe you’ll have to go yet.”
“Next year they’ll call my class. But I won’t go.”
“What will you do?”
“Get out of the country. I wouldn’t go to war. I was at the war once in
Abyssinia. Nix. Why do you go?”
“I don’t know. I was a fool.”
“Have another vermouth?”
“All right.”
The barman rowed back. We trolled up the lake beyond Stresa and then
down not far from shore. I held the taut line and felt the faint pulsing
of the spinner revolving while I looked at the dark November water of
the lake and the deserted shore. The barman rowed with long strokes and
on the forward thrust of the boat the line throbbed. Once I had a
strike: the line hardened suddenly and jerked back, I pulled and felt
the live weight of the trout and then the line throbbed again. I had
missed him.
“Did he feel big?”
“Pretty big.”
“Once when I was out trolling alone I had the line in my teeth and one
struck and nearly took my mouth out.”
“The best way is to have it over your leg,” I said. “Then you feel it
and don’t lose your teeth.”
I put my hand in the water. It was very cold. We were almost opposite
the hotel now.
“I have to go in,” the barman said, “to be there for eleven o’clock.
_L’heure du cocktail._”
“All right.”
I pulled in the line and wrapped it on a stick notched at each end. The
barman put the boat in a little slip in the stone wall and locked it
with a chain and padlock.
“Any time you want it,” he said, “I’ll give you the key.”
“Thanks.”
We went up to the hotel and in to the bar. I did not want another drink
so early in the morning so I went up to our room. The maid had just
finished doing the room and Catherine was not back yet. I lay down on
the bed and tried to keep from thinking.
When Catherine came back it was all right again. Ferguson was
downstairs, she said. She was coming to lunch.
“I knew you wouldn’t mind,” Catherine said.
“No,” I said.
“What’s the matter, darling?”
“I don’t know.”
“I know. You haven’t anything to do. All you have is me and I go away.”
“That’s true.”
“I’m sorry, darling. I know it must be a dreadful feeling to have
nothing at all suddenly.”
“My life used to be full of everything,” I said. “Now if you aren’t with
me I haven’t a thing in the world.”
“But I’ll be with you. I was only gone for two hours. Isn’t there
anything you can do?”
“I went fishing with the barman.”
“Wasn’t it fun?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t think about me when I’m not here.”
“That’s the way I worked it at the front. But there was something to do
then.”
“Othello with his occupation gone,” she teased.
“Othello was a nigger,” I said. “Besides, I’m not jealous. I’m just so
in love with you that there isn’t anything else.”
“Will you be a good boy and be nice to Ferguson?”
“I’m always nice to Ferguson unless she curses me.”
“Be nice to her. Think how much we have and she hasn’t anything.”
“I don’t think she wants what we have.”
“You don’t know much, darling, for such a wise boy.”
“I’ll be nice to her.”
“I know you will. You’re so sweet.”
“She won’t stay afterward, will she?”
“No. I’ll get rid of her.”
“And then we’ll come up here.”
“Of course. What do you think I want to do?”
We went downstairs to have lunch with Ferguson. She was very impressed
by the hotel and the splendor of the dining-room. We had a good lunch
with a couple of bottles of white capri. Count Greffi came into the
dining-room and bowed to us. His niece, who looked a little like my
grandmother, was with him. I told Catherine and Ferguson about him and
Ferguson was very impressed. The hotel was very big and grand and empty
but the food was good, the wine was very pleasant and finally the wine
made us all feel very well. Catherine had no need to feel any better.
She was very happy. Ferguson became quite cheerful. I felt very well
myself. After lunch Ferguson went back to her hotel. She was going to
lie down for a while after lunch she said.
Along late in the afternoon some one knocked on our door.
“Who is it?”
“The Count Greffi wishes to know if you will play billiards with him.”
I looked at my watch; I had taken it off and it was under the pillow.
“Do you have to go, darling?” Catherine whispered.
“I think I’d better.” The watch was a quarter-past four o’clock. Out
loud I said, “Tell the Count Greffi I will be in the billiard-room at
five o’clock.”
At a quarter to five I kissed Catherine good-by and went into the
bathroom to dress. Knotting my tie and looking in the glass I looked
strange to myself in the civilian clothes. I must remember to buy some
more shirts and socks.
“Will you be away a long time?” Catherine asked. She looked lovely in
the bed. “Would you hand me the brush?”
I watched her brushing her hair, holding her head so the weight of her
hair all came on one side. It was dark outside and the light over the
head of the bed shone on her hair and on her neck and shoulders. I went
over and kissed her and held her hand with the brush and her head sunk
back on the pillow. I kissed her neck and shoulders. I felt faint with
loving her so much.
“I don’t want to go away.”
“I don’t want you to go away.”
“I won’t go then.”
“Yes. Go. It’s only for a little while and then you’ll come back.”
“We’ll have dinner up here.”
“Hurry and come back.”
I found the Count Greffi in the billiard-room. He was practising
strokes, looking very fragile under the light that came down above the
billiard table. On a card table a little way beyond the light was a
silver icing-bucket with the necks and corks of two champagne bottles
showing above the ice. The Count Greffi straightened up when I came
toward the table and walked toward me. He put out his hand, “It is such
a great pleasure that you are here. You were very kind to come to play
with me.”
“It was very nice of you to ask me.”
“Are you quite well? They told me you were wounded on the Isonzo. I hope
you are well again.”
“I’m very well. Have you been well?”
“Oh, I am always well. But I am getting old. I detect signs of age now.”
“I can’t believe it.”
“Yes. Do you want to know one? It is easier for me to talk Italian. I
discipline myself but I find when I am tired that it is so much easier
to talk Italian. So I know I must be getting old.”
“We could talk Italian. I am a little tired too.”
“Oh, but when you are tired it will be easier for you to talk English.”
“American.”
“Yes. American. You will please talk American. It is a delightful
language.”
“I hardly ever see Americans.”
“You must miss them. One misses one’s countrymen and especially one’s
countrywomen. I know that experience. Should we play or are you too
tired?”
“I’m not really tired. I said that for a joke. What handicap will you
give me?”
“Have you been playing very much?”
“None at all.”
“You play very well. Ten points in a hundred?”
“You flatter me.”
“Fifteen?”
“That would be fine but you will beat me.”
“Should we play for a stake? You always wished to play for a stake.”
“I think we’d better.”
“All right. I will give you eighteen points and we will play for a franc
a point.”
He played a lovely game of billiards and with the handicap I was only
four ahead at fifty. Count Greffi pushed a button on the wall to ring
for the barman.
“Open one bottle please,” he said. Then to me, “We will take a little
stimulant.” The wine was icy cold and very dry and good.
“Should we talk Italian? Would you mind very much? It is my great
weakness now.”
We went on playing, sipping the wine between shots, speaking in Italian,
but talking little, concentrated on the game. Count Greffi made his one
hundredth point and with the handicap I was only at ninety-four. He
smiled and patted me on the shoulder.
“Now we will drink the other bottle and you will tell me about the war.”
He waited for me to sit down.
“About anything else,” I said.
“You don’t want to talk about it? Good. What have you been reading?”
“Nothing,” I said. “I’m afraid I am very dull.”
“No. But you should read.”
“What is there written in war-time?”
“There is ‘Le Feu’ by a Frenchman, Barbusse. There is ‘Mr. Britling Sees
Through It.’”
“No, he doesn’t.”
“What?”
“He doesn’t see through it. Those books were at the hospital.”
“Then you have been reading?”
“Yes, but nothing any good.”
“I thought ‘Mr. Britling’ a very good study of the English middle-class
soul.”
“I don’t know about the soul.”
“Poor boy. We none of us know about the soul. Are you _Croyant_?”
“At night.”
Count Greffi smiled and turned the glass with his fingers. “I had
expected to become more devout as I grow older but somehow I haven’t,”
he said. “It is a great pity.”
“Would you like to live after death?” I asked and instantly felt a fool
to mention death. But he did not mind the word.
“It would depend on the life. This life is very pleasant. I would like
to live forever,” he smiled. “I very nearly have.”
We were sitting in the deep leather chairs, the champagne in the
ice-bucket and our glasses on the table between us.
“If you ever live to be as old as I am you will find many things
strange.”
“You never seem old.”
“It is the body that is old. Sometimes I am afraid I will break off a
finger as one breaks a stick of chalk. And the spirit is no older and
not much wiser.”
“You are wise.”
“No, that is the great fallacy; the wisdom of old men. They do not grow
wise. They grow careful.”
“Perhaps that is wisdom.”
“It is a very unattractive wisdom. What do you value most?”
“Some one I love.”
“With me it is the same. That is not wisdom. Do you value life?”
“Yes.”
“So do I. Because it is all I have. And to give birthday parties,” he
laughed. “You are probably wiser than I am. You do not give birthday
parties.”
We both drank the wine.
“What do you think of the war really?” I asked.
“I think it is stupid.”
“Who will win it?”
“Italy.”
“Why?”
“They are a younger nation.”
“Do younger nations always win wars?”
“They are apt to for a time.”
“Then what happens?”
“They become older nations.”
“You said you were not wise.”
“Dear boy, that is not wisdom. That is cynicism.”
“It sounds very wise to me.”
“It’s not particularly. I could quote you the examples on the other
side. But it is not bad. Have we finished the champagne?”
“Almost.”
“Should we drink some more? Then I must dress.”
“Perhaps we’d better not now.”
“You are sure you don’t want more?”
“Yes.” He stood up.
“I hope you will be very fortunate and very happy and very, very
healthy.”
“Thank you. And I hope you will live forever.”
“Thank you. I have. And if you ever become devout pray for me if I am
dead. I am asking several of my friends to do that. I had expected to
become devout myself but it has not come.” I thought he smiled sadly but
I could not tell. He was so old and his face was very wrinkled, so that
a smile used so many lines that all gradations were lost.
“I might become very devout,” I said. “Anyway, I will pray for you.”
“I had always expected to become devout. All my family died very devout.
But somehow it does not come.”
“It’s too early.”
“Maybe it is too late. Perhaps I have outlived my religious feeling.”
“My own comes only at night.”
“Then too you are in love. Do not forget that is a religious feeling.”
“You believe so?”
“Of course.” He took a step toward the table. “You were very kind to
play.”
“It was a great pleasure.”
“We will walk upstairs together.”
CHAPTER XXXVI
That night there was a storm and I woke to hear the rain lashing the
window-panes. It was coming in the open window. Some one had knocked on
the door. I went to the door very softly, not to disturb Catherine, and
opened it. The barman stood there. He wore his overcoat and carried his
wet hat.
“Can I speak to you, Tenente?”
“What’s the matter?”
“It’s a very serious matter.”
I looked around. The room was dark. I saw the water on the floor from
the window. “Come in,” I said. I took him by the arm into the bathroom;
locked the door and put on the light. I sat down on the edge of the
bathtub.
“What’s the matter, Emilio? Are you in trouble?”
“No. You are, Tenente.”
“Yes?”
“They are going to arrest you in the morning.”
“Yes?”
“I came to tell you. I was out in the town and I heard them talking in a
café.”
“I see.”
He stood there, his coat wet, holding his wet hat and said nothing.
“Why are they going to arrest me?”
“For something about the war.”
“Do you know what?”
“No. But I know that they know you were here before as an officer and
now you are here out of uniform. After this retreat they arrest
everybody.”
I thought a minute.
“What time do they come to arrest me?”
“In the morning. I don’t know the time.”
“What do you say to do?”
He put his hat in the washbowl. It was very wet and had been dripping on
the floor.
“If you have nothing to fear an arrest is nothing. But it is always bad
to be arrested—especially now.”
“I don’t want to be arrested.”
“Then go to Switzerland.”
“How?”
“In my boat.”
“There is a storm,” I said.
“The storm is over. It is rough but you will be all right.”
“When should we go?”
“Right away. They might come to arrest you early in the morning.”
“What about our bags?”
“Get them packed. Get your lady dressed. I will take care of them.”
“Where will you be?”
“I will wait here. I don’t want any one to see me outside in the hall.”
I opened the door, closed it, and went into the bedroom. Catherine was
awake.
“What is it, darling?”
“It’s all right, Cat,” I said. “Would you like to get dressed right away
and go in a boat to Switzerland?”
“Would you?”
“No,” I said. “I’d like to go back to bed.”
“What is it about?”
“The barman says they are going to arrest me in the morning.”
“Is the barman crazy?”
“No.”
“Then please hurry, darling, and get dressed so we can start.” She sat
up on the side of the bed. She was still sleepy. “Is that the barman in
the bathroom?”
“Yes.”
“Then I won’t wash. Please look the other way, darling, and I’ll be
dressed in just a minute.”
I saw her white back as she took off her nightgown and then I looked
away because she wanted me to. She was beginning to be a little big with
the child and she did not want me to see her. I dressed hearing the rain
on the windows. I did not have much to put in my bag.
“There’s plenty of room in my bag, Cat, if you need any.”
“I’m almost packed,” she said. “Darling, I’m awfully stupid, but why is
the barman in the bathroom?”
“Sh—he’s waiting to take our bags down.”
“He’s awfully nice.”
“He’s an old friend,” I said. “I nearly sent him some pipe-tobacco
once.”
I looked out the open window at the dark night. I could not see the
lake, only the dark and the rain but the wind was quieter.
“I’m ready, darling,” Catherine said.
“All right.” I went to the bathroom door. “Here are the bags, Emilio,” I
said. The barman took the two bags.
“You’re very good to help us,” Catherine said.
“That’s nothing, lady,” the barman said. “I’m glad to help you just so I
don’t get in trouble myself. Listen,” he said to me. “I’ll take these
out the servants’ stairs and to the boat. You just go out as though you
were going for a walk.”
“It’s a lovely night for a walk,” Catherine said.
“It’s a bad night all right.”
“I’m glad I’ve an umbrella,” Catherine said.
We walked down the hall and down the wide thickly carpeted stairs. At
the foot of the stairs by the door the porter sat behind his desk.
He looked surprised at seeing us.
“You’re not going out, sir?” he said.
“Yes,” I said. “We’re going to see the storm along the lake.”
“Haven’t you got an umbrella, sir?”
“No,” I said. “This coat sheds water.”
He looked at it doubtfully. “I’ll get you an umbrella, sir,” he said. He
went away and came back with a big umbrella. “It is a little big, sir,”
he said. I gave him a ten-lira note. “Oh you are too good, sir. Thank
you very much,” he said. He held the door open and we went out into the
rain. He smiled at Catherine and she smiled at him. “Don’t stay out in
the storm,” he said. “You will get wet, sir and lady.” He was only the
second porter, and his English was still literally translated.
“We’ll be back,” I said. We walked down the path under the giant
umbrella and out through the dark wet gardens to the road and across the
road to the trellised pathway along the lake. The wind was blowing
offshore now. It was a cold, wet November wind and I knew it was snowing
in the mountains. We came along past the chained boats in the slips
along the quay to where the barman’s boat should be. The water was dark
against the stone. The barman stepped out from beside the row of trees.
“The bags are in the boat,” he said.
“I want to pay you for the boat,” I said.
“How much money have you?”
“Not so much.”
“You send me the money later. That will be all right.”
“How much?”
“What you want.”
“Tell me how much.”
“If you get through send me five hundred francs. You won’t mind that if
you get through.”
“All right.”
“Here are sandwiches.” He handed me a package. “Everything there was in
the bar. It’s all here. This is a bottle of brandy and a bottle of
wine.” I put them in my bag. “Let me pay you for those.”
“All right, give me fifty lire.”
I gave it to him. “The brandy is good,” he said. “You don’t need to be
afraid to give it to your lady. She better get in the boat.” He held the
boat, it rising and falling against the stone wall and I helped
Catherine in. She sat in the stern and pulled her cape around her.
“You know where to go?”
“Up the lake.”
“You know how far?”
“Past Luino.”
“Past Luino, Cannero, Cannobio, Tranzano. You aren’t in Switzerland
until you come to Brissago. You have to pass Monte Tamara.”
“What time is it?” Catherine asked.
“It’s only eleven o’clock,” I said.
“If you row all the time you ought to be there by seven o’clock in the
morning.”
“Is it that far?”
“It’s thirty-five kilometres.”
“How should we go? In this rain we need a compass.”
“No. Row to Isola Bella. Then on the other side of Isola Madre go with
the wind. The wind will take you to Pallanza. You will see the lights.
Then go up the shore.”
“Maybe the wind will change.”
“No,” he said. “This wind will blow like this for three days. It comes
straight down from the Mattarone. There is a can to bail with.”
“Let me pay you something for the boat now.”
“No, I’d rather take a chance. If you get through you pay me all you
can.”
“All right.”
“I don’t think you’ll get drowned.”
“That’s good.”
“Go with the wind up the lake.”
“All right.” I stepped in the boat.
“Did you leave the money for the hotel?”
“Yes. In an envelope in the room.”
“All right. Good luck, Tenente.”
“Good luck. We thank you many times.”
“You won’t thank me if you get drowned.”
“What does he say?” Catherine asked.
“He says good luck.”
“Good luck,” Catherine said. “Thank you very much.”
“Are you ready?”
“Yes.”
He bent down and shoved us off. I dug at the water with the oars, then
waved one hand. The barman waved back deprecatingly. I saw the lights of
the hotel and rowed out, rowing straight out until they were out of
sight. There was quite a sea running but we were going with the wind.
CHAPTER XXXVII
I rowed in the dark keeping the wind in my face. The rain had stopped
and only came occasionally in gusts. It was very dark, and the wind was
cold. I could see Catherine in the stern but I could not see the water
where the blades of the oars dipped. The oars were long and there were
no leathers to keep them from slipping out. I pulled, raised, leaned
forward, found the water, dipped and pulled, rowing as easily as I
could. I did not feather the oars because the wind was with us. I knew
my hands would blister and I wanted to delay it as long as I could. The
boat was light and rowed easily. I pulled it along in the dark water. I
could not see, and hoped we would soon come opposite Pallanza.
We never saw Pallanza. The wind was blowing up the lake and we passed
the point that hides Pallanza in the dark and never saw the lights. When
we finally saw some lights much further up the lake and close to the
shore it was Intra. But for a long time we did not see any lights, nor
did we see the shore but rowed steadily in the dark riding with the
waves. Sometimes I missed the water with the oars in the dark as a wave
lifted the boat. It was quite rough; but I kept on rowing, until
suddenly we were close ashore against a point of rock that rose beside
us; the waves striking against it, rushing high up, then falling back. I
pulled hard on the right oar and backed water with the other and we went
out into the lake again; the point was out of sight and we were going on
up the lake.
“We’re across the lake,” I said to Catherine.
“Weren’t we going to see Pallanza?”
“We’ve missed it.”
“How are you, darling?”
“I’m fine.”
“I could take the oars awhile.”
“No, I’m fine.”
“Poor Ferguson,” Catherine said. “In the morning she’ll come to the
hotel and find we’re gone.”
“I’m not worrying so much about that,” I said, “as about getting into
the Swiss part of the lake before it’s daylight and the custom guards
see us.”
“Is it a long way?”
“It’s thirty some kilometres from here.”
I rowed all night. Finally my hands were so sore I could hardly close
them over the oars. We were nearly smashed up on the shore several
times. I kept fairly close to the shore because I was afraid of getting
lost on the lake and losing time. Sometimes we were so close we could
see a row of trees and the road along the shore with the mountains
behind. The rain stopped and the wind drove the clouds so that the moon
shone through and looking back I could see the long dark point of
Castagnola and the lake with white-caps and beyond, the moon on the high
snow mountains. Then the clouds came over the moon again and the
mountains and the lake were gone, but it was much lighter than it had
been before and we could see the shore. I could see it too clearly and
pulled out where they would not see the boat if there were custom guards
along the Pallanza road. When the moon came out again we could see white
villas on the shore on the slopes of the mountain and the white road
where it showed through the trees. All the time I was rowing.
The lake widened and across it on the shore at the foot of the mountains
on the other side we saw a few lights that should be Luino. I saw a
wedgelike gap between the mountains on the other shore and I thought
that must be Luino. If it was we were making good time. I pulled in the
oars and lay back on the seat. I was very, very tired of rowing. My arms
and shoulders and back ached and my hands were sore.
“I could hold the umbrella,” Catherine said. “We could sail with that
with the wind.”
“Can you steer?”
“I think so.”
“You take this oar and hold it under your arm close to the side of the
boat and steer and I’ll hold the umbrella.” I went back to the stern and
showed her how to hold the oar. I took the big umbrella the porter had
given me and sat facing the bow and opened it. It opened with a clap. I
held it on both sides, sitting astride the handle hooked over the seat.
The wind was full in it and I felt the boat suck forward while I held as
hard as I could to the two edges. It pulled hard. The boat was moving
fast.
“We’re going beautifully,” Catherine said. All I could see was umbrella
ribs. The umbrella strained and pulled and I felt us driving along with
it. I braced my feet and held back on it, then suddenly, it buckled; I
felt a rib snap on my forehead, I tried to grab the top that was bending
with the wind and the whole thing buckled and went inside-out and I was
astride the handle of an inside-out, ripped umbrella, where I had been
holding a wind-filled pulling sail. I unhooked the handle from the seat,
laid the umbrella in the bow and went back to Catherine for the oar. She
was laughing. She took my hand and kept on laughing.
“What’s the matter?” I took the oar.
“You looked so funny holding that thing.”
“I suppose so.”
“Don’t be cross, darling. It was awfully funny. You looked about twenty
feet broad and very affectionate holding the umbrella by the edges—”
she choked.
“I’ll row.”
“Take a rest and a drink. It’s a grand night and we’ve come a long way.”
“I have to keep the boat out of the trough of the waves.”
“I’ll get you a drink. Then rest a little while, darling.”
I held the oars up and we sailed with them. Catherine was opening the
bag. She handed me the brandy bottle. I pulled the cork with my
pocket-knife and took a long drink. It was smooth and hot and the heat
went all through me and I felt warmed and cheerful. “It’s lovely
brandy,” I said. The moon was under again but I could see the shore.
There seemed to be another point going out a long way ahead into the
lake.
“Are you warm enough, Cat?”
“I’m splendid. I’m a little stiff.”
“Bail out that water and you can put your feet down.”
Then I rowed and listened to the oarlocks and the dip and scrape of the
bailing tin under the stern seat.
“Would you give me the bailer?” I said. “I want a drink.”
“It’s awfully dirty.”
“That’s all right. I’ll rinse it.”
I heard Catherine rinsing it over the side. Then she handed it to me
dipped full of water. I was thirsty after the brandy and the water was
icy cold, so cold it made my teeth ache. I looked toward the shore. We
were closer to the long point. There were lights in the bay ahead.
“Thanks,” I said and handed back the tin pail.
“You’re ever so welcome,” Catherine said. “There’s much more if you want
it.”
“Don’t you want to eat something?”
“No. I’ll be hungry in a little while. We’ll save it till then.”
“All right.”
What looked like a point ahead was a long high headland. I went further
out in the lake to pass it. The lake was much narrower now. The moon was
out again and the _guardia di Finanza_ could have seen our boat black on
the water if they had been watching.
“How are you, Cat?” I asked.
“I’m all right. Where are we?”
“I don’t think we have more than about eight miles more.”
“That’s a long way to row, you poor sweet. Aren’t you dead?”
“No. I’m all right. My hands are sore is all.”
We went on up the lake. There was a break in the mountains on the right
bank, a flattening-out with a low shore-line that I thought must be
Cannobio. I stayed a long way out because it was from now on that we ran
the most danger of meeting _guardia_. There was a high dome-capped
mountain on the other shore a way ahead. I was tired. It was no great
distance to row but when you were out of condition it had been a long
way. I knew I had to pass that mountain and go up the lake at least five
miles further before we would be in Swiss water. The moon was almost
down now but before it went down the sky clouded over again and it was
very dark. I stayed well out in the lake, rowing awhile, then resting
and holding the oars so that the wind struck the blades.
“Let me row awhile,” Catherine said.
“I don’t think you ought to.”
“Nonsense. It would be good for me. It would keep me from being too
stiff.”
“I don’t think you should, Cat.”
“Nonsense. Rowing in moderation is very good for the pregnant lady.”
“All right, you row a little moderately. I’ll go back, then you come up.
Hold on to both gunwales when you come up.”
I sat in the stern with my coat on and the collar turned up and watched
Catherine row. She rowed very well but the oars were too long and
bothered her. I opened the bag and ate a couple of sandwiches and took a
drink of the brandy. It made everything much better and I took another
drink.
“Tell me when you’re tired,” I said. Then a little later, “watch out the
oar doesn’t pop you in the tummy.”
“If it did”—Catherine said between strokes—“life might be much
simpler.”
I took another drink of the brandy.
“How are you going?”
“All right.”
“Tell me when you want to stop.”
“All right.”
I took another drink of the brandy, then took hold of the two gunwales
of the boat and moved forward.
“No. I’m going beautifully.”
“Go on back to the stern. I’ve had a grand rest.”
For a while, with the brandy, I rowed easily and steadily. Then I began
to catch crabs and soon I was just chopping along again with a thin
brown taste of bile from having rowed too hard after the brandy.
“Give me a drink of water, will you?” I said.
“That’s easy,” Catherine said.
Before daylight it started to drizzle. The wind was down or we were
protected by mountains that bounded the curve the lake had made. When I
knew daylight was coming I settled down and rowed hard. I did not know
where we were and I wanted to get into the Swiss part of the lake. When
it was beginning to be daylight we were quite close to the shore. I
could see the rocky shore and the trees.
“What’s that?” Catherine said. I rested on the oars and listened. It was
a motor boat chugging out on the lake. I pulled close up to the shore
and lay quiet. The chugging came closer; then we saw the motor boat in
the rain a little astern of us. There were four _guardia_ _di finanza_
in the stern, their _alpini_ hats pulled down, their cape collars turned
up and their carbines slung across their backs. They all looked sleepy
so early in the morning. I could see the yellow on their hats and the
yellow marks on their cape collars. The motor boat chugged on and out of
sight in the rain.
I pulled out into the lake. If we were that close to the border I did
not want to be hailed by a sentry along the road. I stayed out where I
could just see the shore and rowed on for three-quarters of an hour in
the rain. We heard a motor boat once more but I kept quiet until the
noise of the engine went away across the lake.
“I think we’re in Switzerland, Cat,” I said.
“Really?”
“There’s no way to know until we see Swiss troops.”
“Or the Swiss navy.”
“The Swiss navy’s no joke for us. That last motor boat we heard was
probably the Swiss navy.”
“If we’re in Switzerland let’s have a big breakfast. They have wonderful
rolls and butter and jam in Switzerland.”
It was clear daylight now and a fine rain was falling. The wind was
still blowing outside up the lake and we could see the tops of the
white-caps going away from us and up the lake. I was sure we were in
Switzerland now. There were many houses back in the trees from the shore
and up the shore a way was a village with stone houses, some villas on
the hills and a church. I had been looking at the road that skirted the
shore for guards but did not see any. The road came quite close to the
lake now and I saw a soldier coming out of a café on the road. He wore a
gray-green uniform and a helmet like the Germans. He had a
healthy-looking face and a little toothbrush mustache. He looked at us.
“Wave to him,” I said to Catherine. She waved and the soldier smiled
embarrassedly and gave a wave of his hand. I eased up rowing. We were
passing the waterfront of the village.
“We must be well inside the border,” I said.
“We want to be sure, darling. We don’t want them to turn us back at the
frontier.”
“The frontier is a long way back. I think this is the customs town. I’m
pretty sure it’s Brissago.”
“Won’t there be Italians there? There are always both sides at a customs
town.”
“Not in war-time. I don’t think they let the Italians cross the
frontier.”
It was a nice-looking little town. There were many fishing boats along
the quay and nets were spread on racks. There was a fine November rain
falling but it looked cheerful and clean even with the rain.
“Should we land then and have breakfast?”
“All right.”
I pulled hard on the left oar and came in close, then straightened out
when we were close to the quay and brought the boat alongside. I pulled
in the oars, took hold of an iron ring, stepped up on the wet stone and
was in Switzerland. I tied the boat and held my hand down to Catherine.
“Come on up, Cat. It’s a grand feeling.”
“What about the bags?”
“Leave them in the boat.”
Catherine stepped up and we were in Switzerland together.
“What a lovely country,” she said.
“Isn’t it grand?”
“Let’s go and have breakfast!”
“Isn’t it a grand country? I love the way it feels under my shoes.”
“I’m so stiff I can’t feel it very well. But it feels like a splendid
country. Darling, do you realize we’re here and out of that bloody
place?”
“I do. I really do. I’ve never realized anything before.”
“Look at the houses. Isn’t this a fine square? There’s a place we can
get breakfast.”
“Isn’t the rain fine? They never had rain like this in Italy. It’s
cheerful rain.”
“And we’re here, darling! Do you realize we’re here?”
We went inside the café and sat down at a clean wooden table. We were
cockeyed excited. A splendid clean-looking woman with an apron came and
asked us what we wanted.
“Rolls and jam and coffee,” Catherine said.
“I’m sorry, we haven’t any rolls in war-time.”
“Bread then.”
“I can make you some toast.”
“All right.”
“I want some eggs fried too.”
“How many eggs for the gentleman?”
“Three.”
“Take four, darling.”
“Four eggs.”
The woman went away. I kissed Catherine and held her hand very tight. We
looked at each other and at the café.
“Darling, darling, isn’t it lovely?”
“It’s grand,” I said.
“I don’t mind there not being rolls,” Catherine said. “I thought about
them all night. But I don’t mind it. I don’t mind it at all.”
“I suppose pretty soon they will arrest us.”
“Never mind, darling. We’ll have breakfast first. You won’t mind being
arrested after breakfast. And then there’s nothing they can do to us.
We’re British and American citizens in good standing.”
“You have a passport, haven’t you?”
“Of course. Oh let’s not talk about it. Let’s be happy.”
“I couldn’t be any happier,” I said. A fat gray cat with a tail that
lifted like a plume crossed the floor to our table and curved against my
leg to purr each time she rubbed. I reached down and stroked her.
Catherine smiled at me very happily. “Here comes the coffee,” she said.
They arrested us after breakfast. We took a little walk through the
village then went down to the quay to get our bags. A soldier was
standing guard over the boat.
“Is this your boat?”
“Yes.”
“Where do you come from?”
“Up the lake.”
“Then I have to ask you to come with me.”
“How about the bags?”
“You can carry the bags.”
I carried the bags and Catherine walked beside me and the soldier walked
along behind us to the old custom house. In the custom house a
lieutenant, very thin and military, questioned us.
“What nationality are you?”
“American and British.”
“Let me see your passports.”
I gave him mine and Catherine got hers out of her handbag.
He examined them for a long time.
“Why do you enter Switzerland this way in a boat?”
“I am a sportsman,” I said. “Rowing is my great sport. I always row when
I get a chance.”
“Why do you come here?”
“For the winter sport. We are tourists and we want to do the winter
sport.”
“This is no place for winter sport.”
“We know it. We want to go where they have the winter sport.”
“What have you been doing in Italy?”
“I have been studying architecture. My cousin has been studying art.”
“Why do you leave there?”
“We want to do the winter sport. With the war going on you cannot study
architecture.”
“You will please stay where you are,” the lieutenant said. He went back
into the building with our passports.
“You’re splendid, darling,” Catherine said. “Keep on the same track. You
want to do the winter sport.”
“Do you know anything about art?”
“Rubens,” said Catherine.
“Large and fat,” I said.
“Titian,” Catherine said.
“Titian-haired,” I said. “How about Mantegna?”
“Don’t ask hard ones,” Catherine said. “I know him though—very bitter.”
“Very bitter,” I said. “Lots of nail holes.”
“You see I’ll make you a fine wife,” Catherine said. “I’ll be able to
talk art with your customers.”
“Here he comes,” I said. The thin lieutenant came down the length of the
custom house, holding our passports.
“I will have to send you into Locarno,” he said. “You can get a carriage
and a soldier will go in with you.”
“All right,” I said. “What about the boat?”
“The boat is confiscated. What have you in those bags?”
He went all through the two bags and held up the quarter-bottle of
brandy. “Would you join me in a drink?” I asked.
“No thank you.” He straightened up. “How much money have you?”
“Twenty-five hundred lire.”
He was favorably impressed. “How much has your cousin?”
Catherine had a little over twelve hundred lire. The lieutenant was
pleased. His attitude toward us became less haughty.
“If you are going for winter sports,” he said, “Wengen is the place. My
father has a very fine hotel at Wengen. It is open all the time.”
“That’s splendid,” I said. “Could you give me the name?”
“I will write it on a card.” He handed me the card very politely.
“The soldier will take you in to Locarno. He will keep your passports. I
regret this but it is necessary. I have good hopes they will give you a
visa or a police permit at Locarno.”
He handed the two passports to the soldier and carrying the bags we
started into the village to order a carriage. “Hi,” the lieutenant
called to the soldier. He said something in a German dialect to him. The
soldier slung his rifle on his back and picked up the bags.
“It’s a great country,” I said to Catherine.
“It’s so practical.”
“Thank you very much,” I said to the lieutenant. He waved his hand.
_“Service!_” he said. We followed our guard into the village.
We drove to Locarno in a carriage with the soldier sitting on the front
seat with the driver. At Locarno we did not have a bad time. They
questioned us but they were polite because we had passports and money. I
do not think they believed a word of the story and I thought it was
silly but it was like a law-court. You did not want something
reasonable, you wanted something technical and then stuck to it without
explanations. But we had passports and we would spend the money. So they
gave us provisional visas. At any time this visa might be withdrawn. We
were to report to the police wherever we went.
Could we go wherever we wanted? Yes. Where did we want to go?
“Where do you want to go, Cat?”
“Montreux.”
“It is a very nice place,” the official said. “I think you will like
that place.”
“Here at Locarno is a very nice place,” another official said. “I am
sure you would like it here very much at Locarno. Locarno is a very
attractive place.”
“We would like some place where there is winter sport.”
“There is no winter sport at Montreux.”
“I beg your pardon,” the other official said. “I come from Montreux.
There is very certainly winter sport on the Montreux Oberland Bernois
railway. It would be false for you to deny that.”
“I do not deny it. I simply said there is no winter sport at Montreux.”
“I question that,” the other official said. “I question that statement.”
“I hold to that statement.”
“I question that statement. I myself have _luge-ed_ into the streets of
Montreux. I have done it not once but several times. Luge-ing is
certainly winter sport.”
The other official turned to me.
“Is luge-ing your idea of winter sport, sir? I tell you you would be
very comfortable here in Locarno. You would find the climate healthy,
you would find the environs attractive. You would like it very much.”
“The gentleman has expressed a wish to go to Montreux.”
“What is luge-ing?” I asked.
“You see he has never even heard of luge-ing!”
That meant a great deal to the second official. He was pleased by that.
“Luge-ing,” said the first official, “is tobogganing.”
“I beg to differ,” the other official shook his head. “I must differ
again. The toboggan is very different from the luge. The toboggan is
constructed in Canada of flat laths. The luge is a common sled with
runners. Accuracy means something.”
“Couldn’t we toboggan?” I asked.
“Of course you could toboggan,” the first official said. “You could
toboggan very well. Excellent Canadian toboggans are sold in Montreux.
Ochs Brothers sell toboggans. They import their own toboggans.”
The second official turned away. “Tobogganing,” he said, “requires a
special _piste_. You could not toboggan into the streets of Montreux.
Where are you stopping here?”
“We don’t know,” I said. “We just drove in from Brissago. The carriage
is outside.”
“You make no mistake in going to Montreux,” the first official said.
“You will find the climate delightful and beautiful. You will have no
distance to go for winter sport.”
“If you really want winter sport,” the second official said, “you will
go to the Engadine or to Mürren. I must protest against your being
advised to go to Montreux for the winter sport.”
“At Les Avants above Montreux there is excellent winter sport of every
sort.” The champion of Montreux glared at his colleague.
“Gentlemen,” I said, “I am afraid we must go. My cousin is very tired.
We will go tentatively to Montreux.”
“I congratulate you,” the first official shook my hand.
“I believe that you will regret leaving Locarno,” the second official
said. “At any rate you will report to the police at Montreux.”
“There will be no unpleasantness with the police,” the first official
assured me. “You will find all the inhabitants extremely courteous and
friendly.”
“Thank you both very much,” I said. “We appreciate your advice very
much.”
“Good-by,” Catherine said. “Thank you both very much.”
They bowed us to the door, the champion of Locarno a little coldly. We
went down the steps and into the carriage.
“My God, darling,” Catherine said. “Couldn’t we have gotten away any
sooner?” I gave the name of a hotel one of the officials had recommended
to the driver. He picked up the reins.
“You’ve forgotten the army,” Catherine said. The soldier was standing by
the carriage. I gave him a ten-lira note. “I have no Swiss money yet,” I
said. He thanked me, saluted and went off. The carriage started and we
drove to the hotel.
“How did you happen to pick out Montreux?” I asked Catherine. “Do you
really want to go there?”
“It was the first place I could think of,” she said. “It’s not a bad
place. We can find some place up in the mountains.”
“Are you sleepy?”
“I’m asleep right now.”
“We’ll get a good sleep. Poor Cat, you had a long bad night.”
“I had a lovely time,” Catherine said. “Especially when you sailed with
the umbrella.”
“Can you realize we’re in Switzerland?”
“No, I’m afraid I’ll wake up and it won’t be true.”
“I am too.”
“It is true, isn’t it, darling? I’m not just driving down to the
_stazione_ in Milan to see you off.”
“I hope not.”
“Don’t say that. It frightens me. Maybe that’s where we’re going.”
“I’m so groggy I don’t know,” I said.
“Let me see your hands.”
I put them out. They were both blistered raw.
“There’s no hole in my side,” I said.
“Don’t be sacrilegious.”
I felt very tired and vague in the head. The exhilaration was all gone.
The carriage was going along the street.
“Poor hands,” Catherine said.
“Don’t touch them,” I said. “By God I don’t know where we are. Where are
we going, driver?” The driver stopped his horse.
“To the Hotel Metropole. Don’t you want to go there?”
“Yes,” I said. “It’s all right, Cat.”
“It’s all right, darling. Don’t be upset. We’ll get a good sleep and you
won’t feel groggy to-morrow.”
“I get pretty groggy,” I said. “It’s like a comic opera to-day. Maybe
I’m hungry.”
“You’re just tired, darling. You’ll be fine.” The carriage pulled up
before the hotel. Some one came out to take our bags.
“I feel all right,” I said. We were down on the pavement going into the
hotel.
“I know you’ll be all right. You’re just tired. You’ve been up a long
time.”
“Anyhow we’re here.”
“Yes, we’re really here.”
We followed the boy with the bags into the hotel.
BOOK V
CHAPTER XXXVIII
That fall the snow came very late. We lived in a brown wooden house in
the pine trees on the side of the mountain and at night there was frost
so that there was thin ice over the water in the two pitchers on the
dresser in the morning. Mrs. Guttingen came into the room early in the
morning to shut the windows and started a fire in the tall porcelain
stove. The pine wood crackled and sparked and then the fire roared in
the stove and the second time Mrs. Guttingen came into the room she
brought big chunks of wood for the fire and a pitcher of hot water. When
the room was warm she brought in breakfast. Sitting up in bed eating
breakfast we could see the lake and the mountains across the lake on the
French side. There was snow on the tops of the mountains and the lake
was a gray steel-blue.
Outside, in front of the chalet a road went up the mountain. The wheel
ruts and ridges were iron hard with the frost, and the road climbed
steadily through the forest and up and around the mountain to where
there were meadows, and barns and cabins in the meadows at the edge of
the woods looking across the valley. The valley was deep and there was a
stream at the bottom that flowed down into the lake and when the wind
blew across the valley you could hear the stream in the rocks.
Sometimes we went off the road and on a path through the pine forest.
The floor of the forest was soft to walk on; the frost did not harden it
as it did the road. But we did not mind the hardness of the road because
we had nails in the soles and heels of our boots and the heel nails bit
on the frozen ruts and with nailed boots it was good walking on the road
and invigorating. But it was lovely walking in the woods.
In front of the house where we lived the mountain went down steeply to
the little plain along the lake and we sat on the porch of the house in
the sun and saw the winding of the road down the mountain-side and the
terraced vineyards on the side of the lower mountain, the vines all dead
now for the winter and the fields divided by stone walls, and below the
vineyards the houses of the town on the narrow plain along the lake
shore. There was an island with two trees on the lake and the trees
looked like the double sails of a fishing-boat. The mountains were sharp
and steep on the other side of the lake and down at the end of the lake
was the plain of the Rhone Valley flat between the two ranges of
mountains; and up the valley where the mountains cut it off was the Dent
du Midi. It was a high snowy mountain and it dominated the valley but it
was so far away that it did not make a shadow.
When the sun was bright we ate lunch on the porch but the rest of the
time we ate upstairs in a small room with plain wooden walls and a big
stove in the corner. We bought books and magazines in the town and a
copy of “Hoyle” and learned many two-handed card games. The small room
with the stove was our living-room. There were two comfortable chairs
and a table for books and magazines and we played cards on the
dining-table when it was cleared away. Mr. and Mrs. Guttingen lived
downstairs and we would hear them talking sometimes in the evening and
they were very happy together too. He had been a headwaiter and she had
worked as maid in the same hotel and they had saved their money to buy
this place. They had a son who was studying to be a headwaiter. He was
at a hotel in Zurich. Downstairs there was a parlor where they sold wine
and beer, and sometimes in the evening we would hear carts stop outside
on the road and men come up the steps to go in the parlor to drink wine.
There was a box of wood in the hall outside the living-room and I kept
up the fire from it. But we did not stay up very late. We went to bed in
the dark in the big bedroom and when I was undressed I opened the
windows and saw the night and the cold stars and the pine trees below
the window and then got into bed as fast as I could. It was lovely in
bed with the air so cold and clear and the night outside the window. We
slept well and if I woke in the night I knew it was from only one cause
and I would shift the feather bed over, very softly so that Catherine
would not be wakened and then go back to sleep again, warm and with the
new lightness of thin covers. The war seemed as far away as the football
games of some one else’s college. But I knew from the papers that they
were still fighting in the mountains because the snow would not come.
Sometimes we walked down the mountain into Montreux. There was a path
went down the mountain but it was steep and so usually we took the road
and walked down on the wide hard road between fields and then below
between the stone walls of the vineyards and on down between the houses
of the villages along the way. There were three villages; Chernex,
Fontanivent, and the other I forget. Then along the road we passed an
old square-built stone château on a ledge on the side of the
mountain-side with the terraced fields of vines, each vine tied to a
stick to hold it up, the vines dry and brown and the earth ready for the
snow and the lake down below flat and gray as steel. The road went down
a long grade below the château and then turned to the right and went
down very steeply and paved with cobbles, into Montreux.
We did not know any one in Montreux. We walked along beside the lake and
saw the swans and the many gulls and terns that flew up when you came
close and screamed while they looked down at the water. Out on the lake
there were flocks of grebes, small and dark, and leaving trails in the
water when they swam. In the town we walked along the main street and
looked in the windows of the shops. There were many big hotels that were
closed but most of the shops were open and the people were very glad to
see us. There was a fine coiffeur’s place where Catherine went to have
her hair done. The woman who ran it was very cheerful and the only
person we knew in Montreux. While Catherine was there I went up to a
beer place and drank dark Munich beer and read the papers. I read the
_Corriere Della Sera_ and the English and American papers from Paris.
All the advertisements were blacked out, supposedly to prevent
communication in that way with the enemy. The papers were bad reading.
Everything was going very badly everywhere. I sat back in the corner
with a heavy mug of dark beer and an opened glazed-paper package of
pretzels and ate the pretzels for the salty flavor and the good way they
made the beer taste and read about disaster. I thought Catherine would
come by but she did not come, so I hung the papers back on the rack,
paid for my beer and went up the street to look for her. The day was
cold and dark and wintry and the stone of the houses looked cold.
Catherine was still in the hair-dresser’s shop. The woman was waving her
hair. I sat in the little booth and watched. It was exciting to watch
and Catherine smiled and talked to me and my voice was a little thick
from being excited. The tongs made a pleasant clicking sound and I could
see Catherine in three mirrors and it was pleasant and warm in the
booth. Then the woman put up Catherine’s hair, and Catherine looked in
the mirror and changed it a little, taking out and putting in pins; then
stood up. “I’m sorry to have taken such a long time.”
“Monsieur was very interested. Were you not, monsieur?” the woman
smiled.
“Yes,” I said.
We went out and up the street. It was cold and wintry and the wind was
blowing. “Oh, darling, I love you so,” I said.
“Don’t we have a fine time?” Catherine said. “Look. Let’s go some place
and have beer instead of tea. It’s very good for young Catherine. It
keeps her small.”
“Young Catherine,” I said. “That loafer.”
“She’s been very good,” Catherine said. “She makes very little trouble.
The doctor says beer will be good for me and keep her small.”
“If you keep her small enough and she’s a boy, maybe he will be a
jockey.”
“I suppose if we really have this child we ought to get married,”
Catherine said. We were in the beer place at the corner table. It was
getting dark outside. It was still early but the day was dark and the
dusk was coming early.
“Let’s get married now,” I said.
“No,” Catherine said. “It’s too embarrassing now. I show too plainly. I
won’t go before any one and be married in this state.”
“I wish we’d gotten married.”
“I suppose it would have been better. But when could we, darling?”
“I don’t know.”
“I know one thing. I’m not going to be married in this splendid matronly
state.”
“You’re not matronly.”
“Oh yes, I am, darling. The hairdresser asked me if this was our first.
I lied and said no, we had two boys and two girls.”
“When will we be married?”
“Any time after I’m thin again. We want to have a splendid wedding with
every one thinking what a handsome young couple.”
“And you’re not worried?”
“Darling, why should I be worried? The only time I ever felt badly was
when I felt like a whore in Milan and that only lasted seven minutes and
besides it was the room furnishings. Don’t I make you a good wife?”
“You’re a lovely wife.”
“Then don’t be too technical, darling. I’ll marry you as soon as I’m
thin again.”
“All right.”
“Do you think I ought to drink another beer? The doctor said I was
rather narrow in the hips and it’s all for the best if we keep young
Catherine small.”
“What else did he say?” I was worried.
“Nothing. I have a wonderful blood-pressure, darling. He admired my
blood-pressure greatly.”
“What did he say about you being too narrow in the hips?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all. He said I shouldn’t ski.”
“Quite right.”
“He said it was too late to start if I’d never done it before. He said I
could ski if I wouldn’t fall down.”
“He’s just a big-hearted joker.”
“Really he was very nice. We’ll have him when the baby comes.”
“Did you ask him if you ought to get married?”
“No. I told him we’d been married four years. You see, darling, if I
marry you I’ll be an American and any time we’re married under American
law the child is legitimate.”
“Where did you find that out?”
“In the New York _World Almanac_ in the library.”
“You’re a grand girl.”
“I’ll be very glad to be an American and we’ll go to America won’t we,
darling? I want to see Niagara Falls.”
“You’re a fine girl.”
“There’s something else I want to see but I can’t remember it.”
“The stockyards?”
“No. I can’t remember it.”
“The Woolworth building?”
“No.”
“The Grand Canyon?”
“No. But I’d like to see that.”
“What was it?”
“The Golden Gate! That’s what I want to see. Where is the Golden Gate?”
“San Francisco.”
“Then let’s go there. I want to see San Francisco anyway.”
“All right. We’ll go there.”
“Now let’s go up the mountain. Should we? Can we get the M. O. B.?”
“There’s a train a little after five.”
“Let’s get that.”
“All right. I’ll drink one more beer first.”
When we went out to go up the street and climb the stairs to the station
it was very cold. A cold wind was coming down the Rhone valley. There
were lights in the shop windows and we climbed the steep stone stairway
to the upper street, then up another stairs to the station. The electric
train was there waiting, all the lights on. There was a dial that showed
when it left. The clock hands pointed to ten minutes after five. I
looked at the station clock. It was five minutes after. As we got on
board I saw the motorman and conductor coming out of the station wine
shop. We sat down and opened the window. The train was electrically
heated and stuffy but fresh cold air came in through the window.
“Are you tired, Cat?” I asked.
“No. I feel splendid.”
“It isn’t a long ride.”
“I like the ride,” she said. “Don’t worry about me, darling. I feel
fine.”
Snow did not come until three days before Christmas. We woke one morning
and it was snowing. We stayed in bed with the fire roaring in the stove
and watched the snow fall. Mrs. Guttingen took away the breakfast trays
and put more wood in the stove. It was a big snow storm. She said it had
started about midnight. I went to the window and looked out but could
not see across the road. It was blowing and snowing wildly. I went back
to bed and we lay and talked.
“I wish I could ski,” Catherine said. “It’s rotten not to be able to
ski.”
“We’ll get a bobsled and come down the road. That’s no worse for you
than riding in a car.”
“Won’t it be rough?”
“We can see.”
“I hope it won’t be too rough.”
“After a while we’ll take a walk in the snow.”
“Before lunch,” Catherine said, “so we’ll have a good appetite.”
“I’m always hungry.”
“So am I.”
We went out in the snow but it was drifted so that we could not walk
far. I went ahead and made a trail down to the station but when we
reached there we had gone far enough. The snow was blowing so we could
hardly see and we went into the little inn by the station and swept each
other off with a broom and sat on a bench and had vermouths.
“It is a big storm,” the barmaid said.
“Yes.”
“The snow is very late this year.”
“Yes.”
“Could I eat a chocolate bar?” Catherine asked. “Or is it too close to
lunch? I’m always hungry.”
“Go on and eat one,” I said.
“I’ll take one with filberts,” Catherine said.
“They are very good,” the girl said, “I like them the best.”
“I’ll have another vermouth,” I said.
When we came out to start back up the road our track was filled in by
the snow. There were only faint indentations where the holes had been.
The snow blew in our faces so we could hardly see. We brushed off and
went in to have lunch. Mr. Guttingen served the lunch.
“To-morrow there will be skiing,” he said. “Do you ski, Mr. Henry?”
“No. But I want to learn.”
“You will learn very easily. My boy will be here for Christmas and he
will teach you.”
“That’s fine. When does he come?”
“To-morrow night.”
When we were sitting by the stove in the little room after lunch looking
out the window at the snow coming down Catherine said, “Wouldn’t you
like to go on a trip somewhere by yourself, darling, and be with men and
ski?”
“No. Why should I?”
“I should think sometimes you would want to see other people besides
me.”
“Do you want to see other people?”
“No.”
“Neither do I.”
“I know. But you’re different. I’m having a child and that makes me
contented not to do anything. I know I’m awfully stupid now and I talk
too much and I think you ought to get away so you won’t be tired of me.
“Do you want me to go away?”
“No. I want you to stay.”
“That’s what I’m going to do.”
“Come over here,” she said. “I want to feel the bump on your head. It’s
a big bump.” She ran her finger over it. “Darling, would you like to
grow a beard?”
“Would you like me to?”
“It might be fun. I’d like to see you with a beard.”
“All right. I’ll grow one. I’ll start now this minute. It’s a good idea.
It will give me something to do.”
“Are you worried because you haven’t anything to do?”
“No. I like it. I have a fine life. Don’t you?”
“I have a lovely life. But I was afraid because I’m big now that maybe I
was a bore to you.”
“Oh, Cat. You don’t know how crazy I am about you.”
“This way?”
“Just the way you are. I have a fine time. Don’t we have a good life?”
“I do, but I thought maybe you were restless.”
“No. Sometimes I wonder about the front and about people I know but I
don’t worry. I don’t think about anything much.”
“Who do you wonder about?”
“About Rinaldi and the priest and lots of people I know. But I don’t
think about them much. I don’t want to think about the war. I’m through
with it.”
“What are you thinking about now?”
“Nothing.”
“Yes you were. Tell me.”
“I was wondering whether Rinaldi had the syphilis.”
“Was that all?”
“Yes.”
“Has he the syphilis?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’m glad you haven’t. Did you ever have anything like that?”
“I had gonorrhea.”
“I don’t want to hear about it. Was it very painful, darling?”
“Very.”
“I wish I’d had it.”
“No you don’t.”
“I do. I wish I’d had it to be like you. I wish I’d stayed with all your
girls so I could make fun of them to you.”
“That’s a pretty picture.”
“It’s not a pretty picture you having gonorrhea.”
“I know it. Look at it snow now.”
“I’d rather look at you. Darling, why don’t you let your hair grow?”
“How grow?”
“Just grow a little longer.”
“It’s long enough now.”
“No, let it grow a little longer and I could cut mine and we’d be just
alike only one of us blonde and one of us dark.”
“I wouldn’t let you cut yours.”
“It would be fun. I’m tired of it. It’s an awful nuisance in the bed at
night.”
“I like it.”
“Wouldn’t you like it short?”
“I might. I like it the way it is.”
“It might be nice short. Then we’d both be alike. Oh, darling, I want
you so much I want to be you too.”
“You are. We’re the same one.”
“I know it. At night we are.”
“The nights are grand.”
“I want us to be all mixed up. I don’t want you to go away. I just said
that. You go if you want to. But hurry right back. Why, darling, I don’t
live at all when I’m not with you.”
“I won’t ever go away,” I said. “I’m no good when you’re not there. I
haven’t any life at all any more.”
“I want you to have a life. I want you to have a fine life. But we’ll
have it together, won’t we?”
“And now do you want me to stop growing my beard or let it go on?”
“Go on. Grow it. It will be exciting. Maybe it will be done for New
Year’s.”
“Now do you want to play chess?”
“I’d rather play with you.”
“No. Let’s play chess.”
“And afterward we’ll play?”
“Yes.”
“All right.”
I got out the chess-board and arranged the pieces. It was still snowing
hard outside.
One time in the night I woke up and knew that Catherine was awake too.
The moon was shining in the window and made shadows on the bed from the
bars on the window-panes.
“Are you awake, sweetheart?”
“Yes. Can’t you sleep?”
“I just woke up thinking about how I was nearly crazy when I first met
you. Do you remember?”
“You were just a little crazy.”
“I’m never that way any more. I’m grand now. You say grand so sweetly.
Say grand.”
“Grand.”
“Oh, you’re sweet. And I’m not crazy now. I’m just very, very, very
happy.”
“Go on to sleep,” I said.
“All right. Let’s go to sleep at exactly the same moment.”
“All right.”
But we did not. I was awake for quite a long time thinking about things
and watching Catherine sleeping, the moonlight on her face. Then I went
to sleep, too.
CHAPTER XXXIX
By the middle of January I had a beard and the winter had settled into
bright cold days and hard cold nights. We could walk on the roads again.
The snow was packed hard and smooth by the hay-sleds and wood-sledges
and the logs that were hauled down the mountain. The snow lay over all
the country, down almost to Montreux. The mountains on the other side of
the lake were all white and the plain of the Rhone valley was covered.
We took long walks on the other side of the mountain to the Bains de
l’Alliaz. Catherine wore hobnailed boots and a cape and carried a stick
with a sharp steel point. She did not look big with the cape and we
would not walk too fast but stopped and sat on logs by the roadside to
rest when she was tired.
There was an inn in the trees at the Bains de l’Alliaz where the
woodcutters stopped to drink, and we sat inside warmed by the stove and
drank hot red wine with spices and lemon in it. They called it
_glühwein_ and it was a good thing to warm you and to celebrate with.
The inn was dark and smoky inside and afterward when you went out the
cold air came sharply into your lungs and numbed the edge of your nose
as you inhaled. We looked back at the inn with light coming from the
windows and the woodcutters’ horses stamping and jerking their heads
outside to keep warm. There was frost on the hairs of their muzzles and
their breathing made plumes of frost in the air. Going up the road
toward home the road was smooth and slippery for a while and the ice
orange from the horses until the wood-hauling track turned off. Then the
road was clean-packed snow and led through the woods, and twice coming
home in the evening, we saw foxes.
It was a fine country and every time that we went out it was fun.
“You have a splendid beard now,” Catherine said. “It looks just like the
woodcutters’. Did you see the man with the tiny gold ear-rings?”
“He’s a chamois hunter,” I said. “They wear them because they say it
makes them hear better.”
“Really? I don’t believe it. I think they wear them to show they are
chamois hunters. Are there chamois near here?”
“Yes, beyond the Dent de Jaman.”
“It was fun seeing the fox.”
“When he sleeps he wraps that tail around him to keep warm.”
“It must be a lovely feeling.”
“I always wanted to have a tail like that. Wouldn’t it be fun if we had
brushes like a fox?”
“It might be very difficult dressing.”
“We’d have clothes made, or live in a country where it wouldn’t make any
difference.”
“We live in a country where nothing makes any difference. Isn’t it grand
how we never see any one? You don’t want to see people do you, darling?”
“No.”
“Should we sit here just a minute? I’m a little bit tired.”
We sat close together on the logs. Ahead the road went down through the
forest.
“She won’t come between us, will she? The little brat.”
“No. We won’t let her.”
“How are we for money?”
“We have plenty. They honored the last sight draft.”
“Won’t your family try and get hold of you now they know you’re in
Switzerland?”
“Probably. I’ll write them something.”
“Haven’t you written them?”
“No. Only the sight draft.”
“Thank God I’m not your family.”
“I’ll send them a cable.”
“Don’t you care anything about them?”
“I did, but we quarrelled so much it wore itself out.”
“I think I’d like them. I’d probably like them very much.”
“Let’s not talk about them or I’ll start to worry about them.” After a
while I said, “Let’s go on if you’re rested.”
“I’m rested.”
We went on down the road. It was dark now and the snow squeaked under
our boots. The night was dry and cold and very clear.
“I love your beard,” Catherine said. “It’s a great success. It looks so
stiff and fierce and it’s very soft and a great pleasure.”
“Do you like it better than without?”
“I think so. You know, darling, I’m not going to cut my hair now until
after young Catherine’s born. I look too big and matronly now. But after
she’s born and I’m thin again I’m going to cut it and then I’ll be a
fine new and different girl for you. We’ll go together and get it cut,
or I’ll go alone and come and surprise you.”
I did not say anything.
“You won’t say I can’t, will you?”
“No. I think it would be exciting.”
“Oh, you’re so sweet. And maybe I’d look lovely, darling, and be so thin
and exciting to you and you’ll fall in love with me all over again.”
“Hell,” I said, “I love you enough now. What do you want to do? Ruin
me?”
“Yes. I want to ruin you.”
“Good,” I said, “that’s what I want too.”
CHAPTER XL
We had a fine life. We lived through the months of January and February
and the winter was very fine and we were very happy. There had been
short thaws when the wind blew warm and the snow softened and the air
felt like Spring, but always the clear hard cold had come again and the
winter had returned. In March came the first break in the winter. In the
night it started raining. It rained on all morning and turned the snow
to slush and made the mountain-side dismal. There were clouds over the
lake and over the valley. It was raining high up the mountain. Catherine
wore heavy overshoes and I wore Mr. Guttingen’s rubber-boots and we
walked to the station under an umbrella, through the slush and the
running water that was washing the ice of the roads bare, to stop at the
pub before lunch for a vermouth. Outside we could hear the rain.
“Do you think we ought to move into town?”
“What do you think?” Catherine asked.
“If the winter is over and the rain keeps up it won’t be fun up here.
How long is it before young Catherine?”
“About a month. Perhaps a little more.”
“We might go down and stay in Montreux.”
“Why don’t we go to Lausanne? That’s where the hospital is.”
“All right. But I thought maybe that was too big a town.”
“We can be as much alone in a bigger town and Lausanne might be nice.”
“When should we go?”
“I don’t care. Whenever you want, darling. I don’t want to leave here if
you don’t want.”
“Let’s see how the weather turns out.”
It rained for three days. The snow was all gone now on the mountain-side
below the station. The road was a torrent of muddy snow-water. It was
too wet and slushy to go out. On the morning of the third day of rain we
decided to go down into town.
“That is all right, Mr. Henry,” Guttingen said. “You do not have to give
me any notice. I did not think you would want to stay now the bad
weather is come.”
“We have to be near the hospital anyway on account of Madame,” I said.
“I understand,” he said. “Will you come back some time and stay, with
the little one?”
“Yes, if you would have room.”
“In the Spring when it is nice you could come and enjoy it. We could put
the little one and the nurse in the big room that is closed now and you
and Madame could have your same room looking out over the lake.”
“I’ll write about coming,” I said. We packed and left on the train that
went down after lunch. Mr. and Mrs. Guttingen came down to the station
with us and he hauled our baggage down on a sled through the slush. They
stood beside the station in the rain waving good-by.
“They were very sweet,” Catherine said.
“They were fine to us.”
We took the train to Lausanne from Montreux. Looking out the window
toward where we had lived you could not see the mountains for the
clouds. The train stopped in Vevey, then went on, passing the lake on
one side and on the other the wet brown fields and the bare woods and
the wet houses. We came into Lausanne and went into a medium-sized hotel
to stay. It was still raining as we drove through the streets and into
the carriage entrance of the hotel. The concierge with brass keys on his
lapels, the elevator, the carpets on the floors, and the white washbowls
with shining fixtures, the brass bed and the big comfortable bedroom all
seemed very great luxury after the Guttingens. The windows of the room
looked out on a wet garden with a wall topped by an iron fence. Across
the street, which sloped steeply, was another hotel with a similar wall
and garden. I looked out at the rain falling in the fountain of the
garden.
Catherine turned on all the lights and commenced unpacking. I ordered a
whiskey and soda and lay on the bed and read the papers I had bought at
the station. It was March, 1918, and the German offensive had started in
France. I drank the whiskey and soda and read while Catherine unpacked
and moved around the room.
“You know what I have to get, darling,” she said.
“What?”
“Baby clothes. There aren’t many people reach my time without baby
things.”
“You can buy them.”
“I know. That’s what I’ll do to-morrow. I’ll find out what is
necessary.”
“You ought to know. You were a nurse.”
“But so few of the soldiers had babies in the hospitals.”
“I did.”
She hit me with the pillow and spilled the whiskey and soda.
“I’ll order you another,” she said. “I’m sorry I spilled it.”
“There wasn’t much left. Come on over to the bed.”
“No. I have to try and make this room look like something.”
“Like what?”
“Like our home.”
“Hang out the Allied flags.”
“Oh shut up.”
“Say it again.”
“Shut up.”
“You say it so cautiously,” I said. “As though you didn’t want to offend
any one.”
“I don’t.”
“Then come over to the bed.”
“All right.” She came and sat on the bed. “I know I’m no fun for you,
darling. I’m like a big flour-barrel.”
“No you’re not. You’re beautiful and you’re sweet.”
“I’m just something very ungainly that you’ve married.”
“No you’re not. You’re more beautiful all the time.”
“But I will be thin again, darling.”
“You’re thin now.”
“You’ve been drinking.”
“Just whiskey and soda.”
“There’s another one coming,” she said. “And then should we order dinner
up here?”
“That will be good.”
“Then we won’t go out, will we? We’ll just stay in to-night.”
“And play,” I said.
“I’ll drink some wine,” Catherine said. “It won’t hurt me. Maybe we can
get some of our old white capri.”
“I know we can,” I said. “They’ll have Italian wines at a hotel this
size.”
The waiter knocked at the door. He brought the whiskey in a glass with
ice and beside the glass on a tray a small bottle of soda.
“Thank you,” I said. “Put it down there. Will you please have dinner for
two brought up here and two bottles of dry white capri in ice.”
“Do you wish to commence your dinner with soup?”
“Do you want soup, Cat?”
“Please.”
“Bring soup for one.”
“Thank you, sir.” He went out and shut the door. I went back to the
papers and the war in the papers and poured the soda slowly over the ice
into the whiskey. I would have to tell them not to put ice in the
whiskey. Let them bring the ice separately. That way you could tell how
much whiskey there was and it would not suddenly be too thin from the
soda. I would get a bottle of whiskey and have them bring ice and soda.
That was the sensible way. Good whiskey was very pleasant. It was one of
the pleasant parts of life.
“What are you thinking, darling?”
“About whiskey.”
“What about whiskey?”
“About how nice it is.”
Catherine made a face. “All right,” she said.
We stayed at that hotel three weeks. It was not bad; the dining-room was
usually empty and very often we ate in our room at night. We walked in
the town and took the cogwheel railway down to Ouchy and walked beside
the lake. The weather became quite warm and it was like Spring. We
wished we were back in the mountains but the Spring weather lasted only
a few days and then the cold rawness of the breaking-up of winter came
again.
Catherine bought the things she needed for the baby, up in the town. I
went to a gymnasium in the arcade to box for exercise. I usually went up
there in the morning while Catherine stayed late in bed. On the days of
false Spring it was very nice, after boxing and taking a shower, to walk
along the streets smelling the Spring in the air and stop at a café to
sit and watch the people and read the paper and drink a vermouth; then
go down to the hotel and have lunch with Catherine. The professor at the
boxing gymnasium wore mustaches and was very precise and jerky and went
all to pieces if you started after him. But it was pleasant in the gym.
There was good air and light and I worked quite hard, skipping rope,
shadow-boxing, doing abdominal exercises lying on the floor in a patch
of sunlight that came through the open window, and occasionally scaring
the professor when we boxed. I could not shadow-box in front of the
narrow long mirror at first because it looked so strange to see a man
with a beard boxing. But finally I just thought it was funny. I wanted
to take off the beard as soon as I started boxing but Catherine did not
want me to.
Sometimes Catherine and I went for rides out in the country in a
carriage. It was nice to ride when the days were pleasant and we found
two good places where we could ride out to eat. Catherine could not walk
very far now and I loved to ride out along the country roads with her.
When there was a good day we had a splendid time and we never had a bad
time. We knew the baby was very close now and it gave us both a feeling
as though something were hurrying us and we could not lose any time
together.
CHAPTER XLI
One morning I awoke about three o’clock hearing Catherine stirring in
the bed.
“Are you all right, Cat?”
“I’ve been having some pains, darling.”
“Regularly?”
“No, not very.”
“If you have them at all regularly we’ll go to the hospital.”
I was very sleepy and went back to sleep. A little while later I woke
again.
“Maybe you’d better call up the doctor,” Catherine said. “I think maybe
this is it.”
I went to the phone and called the doctor. “How often are the pains
coming?” he asked.
“How often are they coming, Cat?”
“I should think every quarter of an hour.”
“You should go to the hospital then,” the doctor said. “I will dress and
go there right away myself.”
I hung up and called the garage near the station to send up a taxi. No
one answered the phone for a long time. Then I finally got a man who
promised to send up a taxi at once. Catherine was dressing. Her bag was
all packed with the things she would need at the hospital and the baby
things. Outside in the hall I rang for the elevator. There was no
answer. I went downstairs. There was no one downstairs except the
night-watchman. I brought the elevator up myself, put Catherine’s bag in
it, she stepped in and we went down. The night-watchman opened the door
for us and we sat outside on the stone slabs beside the stairs down to
the driveway and waited for the taxi. The night was clear and the stars
were out. Catherine was very excited.
“I’m so glad it’s started,” she said. “Now in a little while it will be
all over.”
“You’re a good brave girl.”
“I’m not afraid. I wish the taxi would come, though.”
We heard it coming up the street and saw its headlights. It turned into
the driveway and I helped Catherine in and the driver put the bag up in
front.
“Drive to the hospital,” I said.
We went out of the driveway and started up the hill.
At the hospital we went in and I carried the bag. There was a woman at
the desk who wrote down Catherine’s name, age, address, relatives and
religion, in a book. She said she had no religion and the woman drew a
line in the space after that word. She gave her name as Catherine Henry.
“I will take you up to your room,” she said. We went up in an elevator.
The woman stopped it and we stepped out and followed her down a hall.
Catherine held tight to my arm.
“This is the room,” the woman said. “Will you please undress and get
into bed? Here is a nightgown for you to wear.”
“I have a nightgown,” Catherine said.
“It is better for you to wear this nightgown,” the woman said.
I went outside and sat on a chair in the hallway.
“You can come in now,” the woman said from the doorway. Catherine was
lying in the narrow bed wearing a plain, square-cut nightgown that
looked as though it were made of rough sheeting. She smiled at me.
“I’m having fine pains now,” she said. The woman was holding her wrist
and timing the pains with a watch.
“That was a big one,” Catherine said. I saw it on her face.
“Where’s the doctor?” I asked the woman.
“He’s lying down sleeping. He will be here when he is needed.”
“I must do something for Madame, now,” the nurse said. “Would you please
step out again?”
I went out into the hall. It was a bare hall with two windows and closed
doors all down the corridor. It smelled of hospital. I sat on the chair
and looked at the floor and prayed for Catherine.
“You can come in,” the nurse said. I went in.
“Hello, darling,” Catherine said.
“How is it?”
“They are coming quite often now.” Her face drew up. Then she smiled.
“That was a real one. Do you want to put your hand on my back again,
nurse?”
“If it helps you,” the nurse said.
“You go away, darling,” Catherine said. “Go out and get something to
eat. I may do this for a long time the nurse says.”
“The first labor is usually protracted,” the nurse said.
“Please go out and get something to eat,” Catherine said. “I’m fine,
really.”
“I’ll stay awhile,” I said.
The pains came quite regularly, then slackened off. Catherine was very
excited. When the pains were bad she called them good ones. When they
started to fall off she was disappointed and ashamed.
“You go out, darling,” she said. “I think you are just making me
self-conscious.” Her face tied up. “There. That was better. I so want to
be a good wife and have this child without any foolishness. Please go
and get some breakfast, darling, and then come back. I won’t miss you.
Nurse is splendid to me.”
“You have plenty of time for breakfast,” the nurse said.
“I’ll go then. Good-by, sweet.”
“Good-by,” Catherine said, “and have a fine breakfast for me too.”
“Where can I get breakfast?” I asked the nurse.
“There’s a café down the street at the square,” she said. “It should be
open now.”
Outside it was getting light. I walked down the empty street to the
café. There was a light in the window. I went in and stood at the zinc
bar and an old man served me a glass of white wine and a brioche. The
brioche was yesterday’s. I dipped it in the wine and then drank a glass
of coffee.
“What do you do at this hour?” the old man asked.
“My wife is in labor at the hospital.”
“So. I wish you good luck.”
“Give me another glass of wine.”
He poured it from the bottle slopping it over a little so some ran down
on the zinc. I drank this glass, paid and went out. Outside along the
street were the refuse cans from the houses waiting for the collector. A
dog was nosing at one of the cans.
“What do you want?” I asked and looked in the can to see if there was
anything I could pull out for him; there was nothing on top but
coffee-grounds, dust and some dead flowers.
“There isn’t anything, dog,” I said. The dog crossed the street. I went
up the stairs in the hospital to the floor Catherine was on and down the
hall to her room. I knocked on the door. There was no answer. I opened
the door; the room was empty, except for Catherine’s bag on a chair and
her dressing-gown hanging on a hook on the wall. I went out and down the
hall, looking for somebody. I found a nurse.
“Where is Madame Henry?”
“A lady has just gone to the delivery room.”
“Where is it?”
“I will show you.”
She took me down to the end of the hall. The door of the room was partly
open. I could see Catherine lying on a table, covered by a sheet. The
nurse was on one side and the doctor stood on the other side of the
table beside some cylinders. The doctor held a rubber mask attached to a
tube in one hand.
“I will give you a gown and you can go in,” the nurse said. “Come in
here, please.”
She put a white gown on me and pinned it at the neck in back with a
safety pin.
“Now you can go in,” she said. I went into the room.
“Hello, darling,” Catherine said in a strained voice. “I’m not doing
much.”
“You are Mr. Henry?” the doctor asked.
“Yes. How is everything going, doctor?”
“Things are going very well,” the doctor said. “We came in here where it
is easy to give gas for the pains.”
“I want it now,” Catherine said. The doctor placed the rubber mask over
her face and turned a dial and I watched Catherine breathing deeply and
rapidly. Then she pushed the mask away. The doctor shut off the petcock.
“That wasn’t a very big one. I had a very big one a while ago. The
doctor made me go clear out, didn’t you, doctor?” Her voice was strange.
It rose on the word doctor.
The doctor smiled.
“I want it again,” Catherine said. She held the rubber tight to her face
and breathed fast. I heard her moaning a little. Then she pulled the
mask away and smiled.
“That was a big one,” she said. “That was a very big one. Don’t you
worry, darling. You go away. Go have another breakfast.”
“I’ll stay,” I said.
We had gone to the hospital about three o’clock in the morning. At noon
Catherine was still in the delivery room. The pains had slackened again.
She looked very tired and worn now but she was still cheerful.
“I’m not any good, darling,” she said. “I’m so sorry. I thought I would
do it very easily. Now—there’s one—” she reached out her hand for the
mask and held it over her face. The doctor moved the dial and watched
her. In a little while it was over.
“It wasn’t much,” Catherine said. She smiled. “I’m a fool about the gas.
It’s wonderful.”
“We’ll get some for the home,” I said.
“_There one comes_,” Catherine said quickly. The doctor turned the dial
and looked at his watch.
“What is the interval now?” I asked.
“About a minute.”
“Don’t you want lunch?”
“I will have something pretty soon,” he said.
“You must have something to eat, doctor,” Catherine said. “I’m so sorry
I go on so long. Couldn’t my husband give me the gas?”
“If you wish,” the doctor said. “You turn it to the numeral two.”
“I see,” I said. There was a marker on a dial that turned with a handle.
“_I want it now_,” Catherine said. She held the mask tight to her face.
I turned the dial to number two and when Catherine put down the mask I
turned it off. It was very good of the doctor to let me do something.
“Did you do it, darling?” Catherine asked. She stroked my wrist.
“Sure.”
“You’re so lovely.” She was a little drunk from the gas.
“I will eat from a tray in the next room,” the doctor said. “You can
call me any moment.” While the time passed I watched him eat, then,
after a while, I saw that he was lying down and smoking a cigarette.
Catherine was getting very tired.
“Do you think I’ll ever have this baby?” she asked.
“Yes, of course you will.”
“I try as hard as I can. I push down but it goes away. _There it comes.
Give it to me._”
At two o’clock I went out and had lunch. There were a few men in the
café sitting with coffee and glasses of kirsch or marc on the tables. I
sat down at a table. “Can I eat?” I asked the waiter.
“It is past time for lunch.”
“Isn’t there anything for all hours?”
“You can have _choucroute_.”
“Give me _choucroute_ and beer.”
“A demi or a bock?”
“A light demi.”
The waiter brought a dish of sauerkraut with a slice of ham over the top
and a sausage buried in the hot wine-soaked cabbage. I ate it and drank
the beer. I was very hungry. I watched the people at the tables in the
café. At one table they were playing cards. Two men at the table next me
were talking and smoking. The café was full of smoke. The zinc bar,
where I had breakfasted, had three people behind it now; the old man, a
plump woman in a black dress who sat behind a counter and kept track of
everything served to the tables, and a boy in an apron. I wondered how
many children the woman had and what it had been like.
When I was through with the _choucroute_ I went back to the hospital.
The street was all clean now. There were no refuse cans out. The day was
cloudy but the sun was trying to come through. I rode upstairs in the
elevator, stepped out and went down the hall to Catherine’s room, where
I had left my white gown. I put it on and pinned it in back at the neck.
I looked in the glass and saw myself looking like a fake doctor with a
beard. I went down the hall to the delivery room. The door was closed
and I knocked. No one answered so I turned the handle and went in. The
doctor sat by Catherine. The nurse was doing something at the other end
of the room.
“Here is your husband,” the doctor said.
“Oh, darling, I have the most wonderful doctor,” Catherine said in a
very strange voice. “He’s been telling me the most wonderful story and
when the pain came too badly he put me all the way out. He’s wonderful.
You’re wonderful, doctor.”
“You’re drunk,” I said.
“I know it,” Catherine said. “But you shouldn’t say it.” Then “_Give it
to me. Give it to me._” She clutched hold of the mask and breathed short
and deep, pantingly, making the respirator click. Then she gave a long
sigh and the doctor reached with his left hand and lifted away the mask.
“That was a very big one,” Catherine said. Her voice was very strange.
“I’m not going to die now, darling. I’m past where I was going to die.
Aren’t you glad?”
“Don’t you get in that place again.”
“I won’t. I’m not afraid of it though. I won’t die, darling.”
“You will not do any such foolishness,” the doctor said. “You would not
die and leave your husband.”
“Oh, no. I won’t die. I wouldn’t die. It’s silly to die. There it comes.
_Give it to me._”
After a while the doctor said, “You will go out, Mr. Henry, for a few
moments and I will make an examination.”
“He wants to see how I am doing,” Catherine said. “You can come back
afterward, darling, can’t he, doctor?”
“Yes,” said the doctor. “I will send word when he can come back.”
I went out the door and down the hall to the room where Catherine was to
be after the baby came. I sat in a chair there and looked at the room. I
had the paper in my coat that I had bought when I went out for lunch and
I read it. It was beginning to be dark outside and I turned the light on
to read. After a while I stopped reading and turned off the light and
watched it get dark outside. I wondered why the doctor did not send for
me. Maybe it was better I was away. He probably wanted me away for a
while. I looked at my watch. If he did not send for me in ten minutes I
would go down anyway.
Poor, poor dear Cat. And this was the price you paid for sleeping
together. This was the end of the trap. This was what people got for
loving each other. Thank God for gas, anyway. What must it have been
like before there were anæsthetics? Once it started, they were in the
mill-race. Catherine had a good time in the time of pregnancy. It wasn’t
bad. She was hardly ever sick. She was not awfully uncomfortable until
toward the last. So now they got her in the end. You never got away with
anything. Get away hell! It would have been the same if we had been
married fifty times. And what if she should die? She won’t die. People
don’t die in childbirth nowadays. That was what all husbands thought.
Yes, but what if she should die? She won’t die. She’s just having a bad
time. The initial labor is usually protracted. She’s only having a bad
time. Afterward we’d say what a bad time and Catherine would say it
wasn’t really so bad. But what if she should die? She can’t die. Yes,
but what if she should die? She can’t, I tell you. Don’t be a fool. It’s
just a bad time. It’s just nature giving her hell. It’s only the first
labor, which is almost always protracted. Yes, but what if she should
die? She can’t die. Why would she die? What reason is there for her to
die? There’s just a child that has to be born, the by-product of good
nights in Milan. It makes trouble and is born and then you look after it
and get fond of it maybe. But what if she should die? She won’t die. But
what if she should die? She won’t. She’s all right. But what if she
should die? She can’t die. But what if she should die? Hey, what about
that? What if she should die?
The doctor came into the room.
“How does it go, doctor?”
“It doesn’t go,” he said.
“What do you mean?”
“Just that. I made an examination—” He detailed the result of the
examination. “Since then I’ve waited to see. But it doesn’t go.”
“What do you advise?”
“There are two things. Either a high forceps delivery which can tear and
be quite dangerous besides being possibly bad for the child, and a
Cæsarean.”
“What is the danger of a Cæsarean?” What if she should die!
“It should be no greater than the danger of an ordinary delivery.”
“Would you do it yourself?”
“Yes. I would need possibly an hour to get things ready and to get the
people I would need. Perhaps a little less.”
“What do you think?”
“I would advise a Cæsarean operation. If it were my wife I would do a
Cæsarean.”
“What are the after effects?”
“There are none. There is only the scar.”
“What about infection?”
“The danger is not so great as in a high forceps delivery.”
“What if you just went on and did nothing?”
“You would have to do something eventually. Mrs. Henry is already losing
much of her strength. The sooner we operate now the safer.”
“Operate as soon as you can,” I said.
“I will go and give the instructions.”
I went into the delivery room. The nurse was with Catherine who lay on
the table, big under the sheet, looking very pale and tired.
“Did you tell him he could do it?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Isn’t that grand. Now it will be all over in an hour. I’m almost done,
darling. I’m going all to pieces. _Please give me that._ It doesn’t
work. _Oh, it doesn’t work!_”
“Breathe deeply.”
“I am. Oh, it doesn’t work any more. It doesn’t work!”
“Get another cylinder,” I said to the nurse.
“That is a new cylinder.”
“I’m just a fool, darling,” Catherine said. “But it doesn’t work any
more.” She began to cry. “Oh, I wanted so to have this baby and not make
trouble, and now I’m all done and all gone to pieces and it doesn’t
work. Oh, darling, it doesn’t work at all. I don’t care if I die if it
will only stop. Oh, please, darling, please make it stop. _There it
comes. Oh Oh Oh!_” She breathed sobbingly in the mask. “It doesn’t work.
It doesn’t work. It doesn’t work. Don’t mind me, darling. Please don’t
cry. Don’t mind me. I’m just gone all to pieces. You poor sweet. I love
you so and I’ll be good again. I’ll be good this time. _Can’t they give
me something?_ If they could only give me something.”
“I’ll make it work. I’ll turn it all the way.”
“Give it to me now.”
I turned the dial all the way and as she breathed hard and deep her hand
relaxed on the mask. I shut off the gas and lifted the mask. She came
back from a long way away.
“That was lovely, darling. Oh, you’re so good to me.
“You be brave, because I can’t do that all the time. It might kill you.”
“I’m not brave any more, darling. I’m all broken. They’ve broken me. I
know it now.”
“Everybody is that way.”
“But it’s awful. They just keep it up till they break you.”
“In an hour it will be over.”
“Isn’t that lovely? Darling, I won’t die, will I?”
“No. I promise you won’t.”
“Because I don’t want to die and leave you, but I get so tired of it and
I feel I’m going to die.”
“Nonsense. Everybody feels that.”
“Sometimes I know I’m going to die.”
“You won’t. You can’t.”
“But what if I should?”
“I won’t let you.”
“Give it to me quick. _Give it to me!_”
Then afterward, “I won’t die. I won’t let myself die.”
“Of course you won’t.”
“You’ll stay with me?”
“Not to watch it.”
“No, just to be there.”
“Sure. I’ll be there all the time.”
“You’re so good to me. There, give it to me. Give me some more. _It’s
not working!_”
I turned the dial to three and then four. I wished the doctor would come
back. I was afraid of the numbers above two.
Finally a new doctor came in with two nurses and they lifted Catherine
onto a wheeled stretcher and we started down the hall. The stretcher
went rapidly down the hall and into the elevator where every one had to
crowd against the wall to make room; then up, then an open door and out
of the elevator and down the hall on rubber wheels to the operating
room. I did not recognize the doctor with his cap and mask on. There was
another doctor and more nurses.
“_They’ve got to give me something_,” Catherine said. “_They’ve got to
give me something._ Oh please, doctor, give me enough to do some good!”
One of the doctors put a mask over her face and I looked through the
door and saw the bright small amphitheatre of the operating room.
“You can go in the other door and sit up there,” a nurse said to me.
There were benches behind a rail that looked down on the white table and
the lights. I looked at Catherine. The mask was over her face and she
was quiet now. They wheeled the stretcher forward. I turned away and
walked down the hall. Two nurses were hurrying toward the entrance to
the gallery.
“It’s a Cæsarean,” one said. “They’re going to do a Cæsarean.”
The other one laughed, “We’re just in time. Aren’t we lucky?” They went
in the door that led to the gallery.
Another nurse came along. She was hurrying too.
“You go right in there. Go right in,” she said.
“I’m staying outside.”
She hurried in. I walked up and down the hall. I was afraid to go in. I
looked out the window. It was dark but in the light from the window I
could see it was raining. I went into a room at the far end of the hall
and looked at the labels on bottles in a glass case. Then I came out and
stood in the empty hall and watched the door of the operating room.
A doctor came out followed by a nurse. He held something in his two
hands that looked like a freshly skinned rabbit and hurried across the
corridor with it and in through another door. I went down to the door he
had gone into and found them in the room doing things to a new-born
child. The doctor held him up for me to see. He held him by the heels
and slapped him.
“Is he all right?”
“He’s magnificent. He’ll weigh five kilos.”
I had no feeling for him. He did not seem to have anything to do with
me. I felt no feeling of fatherhood.
“Aren’t you proud of your son?” the nurse asked. They were washing him
and wrapping him in something. I saw the little dark face and dark hand,
but I did not see him move or hear him cry. The doctor was doing
something to him again. He looked upset.
“No,” I said. “He nearly killed his mother.”
“It isn’t the little darling’s fault. Didn’t you want a boy?”
“No,” I said. The doctor was busy with him. He held him up by the feet
and slapped him. I did not wait to see it. I went out in the hall. I
could go in now and see. I went in the door and a little way down the
gallery. The nurses who were sitting at the rail motioned for me to come
down where they were. I shook my head. I could see enough where I was.
I thought Catherine was dead. She looked dead. Her face was gray, the
part of it that I could see. Down below, under the light, the doctor was
sewing up the great long, forcep-spread, thick-edged, wound. Another
doctor in a mask gave the anæsthetic. Two nurses in masks handed things.
It looked like a drawing of the Inquisition. I knew as I watched I could
have watched it all, but I was glad I hadn’t. I do not think I could
have watched them cut, but I watched the wound closed into a high welted
ridge with quick skilful-looking stitches like a cobbler’s, and was
glad. When the wound was closed I went out into the hall and walked up
and down again. After a while the doctor came out.
“How is she?”
“She is all right. Did you watch?”
He looked tired.
“I saw you sew up. The incision looked very long.”
“You thought so?”
“Yes. Will that scar flatten out?”
“Oh, yes.”
After a while they brought out the wheeled stretcher and took it very
rapidly down the hallway to the elevator. I went along beside it.
Catherine was moaning. Downstairs they put her in the bed in her room. I
sat in a chair at the foot of the bed. There was a nurse in the room. I
got up and stood by the bed. It was dark in the room. Catherine put out
her hand, “Hello, darling,” she said. Her voice was very weak and tired.
“Hello, you sweet.”
“What sort of baby was it?”
“Sh—don’t talk,” the nurse said.
“A boy. He’s long and wide and dark.”
“Is he all right?”
“Yes,” I said. “He’s fine.”
I saw the nurse look at me strangely.
“I’m awfully tired,” Catherine said. “And I hurt like hell. Are you all
right, darling?”
“I’m fine. Don’t talk.”
“You were lovely to me. Oh, darling, I hurt dreadfully. What does he
look like?”
“He looks like a skinned rabbit with a puckered-up old-man’s face.”
“You must go out,” the nurse said. “Madame Henry must not talk.”
“I’ll be outside,” I said.
“Go and get something to eat.”
“No. I’ll be outside.” I kissed Catherine. She was very gray and weak
and tired.
“May I speak to you?” I said to the nurse. She came out in the hall with
me. I walked a little way down the hall.
“What’s the matter with the baby?” I asked.
“Didn’t you know?”
“No.”
“He wasn’t alive.”
“He was dead?”
“They couldn’t start him breathing. The cord was caught around his neck
or something.”
“So he’s dead.”
“Yes. It’s such a shame. He was such a fine big boy. I thought you
knew.”
“No,” I said. “You better go back in with Madame.”
I sat down on the chair in front of a table where there were nurses’
reports hung on clips at the side and looked out of the window. I could
see nothing but the dark and the rain falling across the light from the
window. So that was it. The baby was dead. That was why the doctor
looked so tired. But why had they acted the way they did in the room
with him? They supposed he would come around and start breathing
probably. I had no religion but I knew he ought to have been baptized.
But what if he never breathed at all. He hadn’t. He had never been
alive. Except in Catherine. I’d felt him kick there often enough. But I
hadn’t for a week. Maybe he was choked all the time. Poor little kid. I
wished the hell I’d been choked like that. No I didn’t. Still there
would not be all this dying to go through. Now Catherine would die. That
was what you did. You died. You did not know what it was about. You
never had time to learn. They threw you in and told you the rules and
the first time they caught you off base they killed you. Or they killed
you gratuitously like Aymo. Or gave you the syphilis like Rinaldo. But
they killed you in the end. You could count on that. Stay around and
they would kill you.
Once in camp I put a log on top of the fire and it was full of ants. As
it commenced to burn, the ants swarmed out and went first toward the
centre where the fire was; then turned back and ran toward the end. When
there were enough on the end they fell off into the fire. Some got out,
their bodies burnt and flattened, and went off not knowing where they
were going. But most of them went toward the fire and then back toward
the end and swarmed on the cool end and finally fell off into the fire.
I remember thinking at the time that it was the end of the world and a
splendid chance to be a messiah and lift the log off the fire and throw
it out where the ants could get off onto the ground. But I did not do
anything but throw a tin cup of water on the log, so that I would have
the cup empty to put whiskey in before I added water to it. I think the
cup of water on the burning log only steamed the ants.
So now I sat out in the hall and waited to hear how Catherine was. The
nurse did not come out, so after a while I went to the door and opened
it very softly and looked in. I could not see at first because there was
a bright light in the hall and it was dark in the room. Then I saw the
nurse sitting by the bed and Catherine’s head on a pillow, and she all
flat under the sheet. The nurse put her finger to her lips, then stood
up and came to the door.
“How is she?” I asked.
“She’s all right,” the nurse said. “You should go and have your supper
and then come back if you wish.”
I went down the hall and then down the stairs and out the door of the
hospital and down the dark street in the rain to the café. It was
brightly lighted inside and there were many people at the tables. I did
not see a place to sit, and a waiter came up to me and took my wet coat
and hat and showed me a place at a table across from an elderly man who
was drinking beer and reading the evening paper. I sat down and asked
the waiter what the _plat du jour_ was.
“Veal stew—but it is finished.”
“What can I have to eat?”
“Ham and eggs, eggs with cheese, or _choucroute_.”
“I had _choucroute_ this noon,” I said.
“That’s true,” he said. “That’s true. You ate _choucroute_ this noon.”
He was a middle-aged man with a bald top to his head and his hair
slicked over it. He had a kind face.
“What do you want? Ham and eggs or eggs with cheese?”
“Ham and eggs,” I said, “and beer.”
“A demi-blonde?”
“Yes,” I said.
“I remembered,” he said. “You took a demi-blonde this noon.”
I ate the ham and eggs and drank the beer. The ham and eggs were in a
round dish—the ham underneath and the eggs on top. It was very hot and
at the first mouthful I had to take a drink of beer to cool my mouth. I
was hungry and I asked the waiter for another order. I drank several
glasses of beer. I was not thinking at all but read the paper of the man
opposite me. It was about the break through on the British front. When
he realized I was reading the back of his paper he folded it over. I
thought of asking the waiter for a paper, but I could not concentrate.
It was hot in the café and the air was bad. Many of the people at the
tables knew one another. There were several card games going on. The
waiters were busy bringing drinks from the bar to the tables. Two men
came in and could find no place to sit. They stood opposite the table
where I was. I ordered another beer. I was not ready to leave yet. It
was too soon to go back to the hospital. I tried not to think and to be
perfectly calm. The men stood around but no one was leaving, so they
went out. I drank another beer. There was quite a pile of saucers now on
the table in front of me. The man opposite me had taken off his
spectacles, put them away in a case, folded his paper and put it in his
pocket and now sat holding his liqueur glass and looking out at the
room. Suddenly I knew I had to get back. I called the waiter, paid the
reckoning, got into my coat, put on my hat and started out the door. I
walked through the rain up to the hospital.
Upstairs I met the nurse coming down the hall.
“I just called you at the hotel,” she said. Something dropped inside me.
“What is wrong?”
“Mrs. Henry has had a hemorrhage.”
“Can I go in?”
“No, not yet. The doctor is with her.”
“Is it dangerous?”
“It is very dangerous.” The nurse went into the room and shut the door.
I sat outside in the hall. Everything was gone inside of me. I did not
think. I could not think. I knew she was going to die and I prayed that
she would not. Don’t let her die. Oh, God, please don’t let her die.
I’ll do anything for you if you won’t let her die. Please, please,
please, dear God, don’t let her die. Dear God, don’t let her die.
Please, please, please don’t let her die. God please make her not die.
I’ll do anything you say if you don’t let her die. You took the baby but
don’t let her die. That was all right but don’t let her die. Please,
please, dear God, don’t let her die.
The nurse opened the door and motioned with her finger for me to come. I
followed her into the room. Catherine did not look up when I came in. I
went over to the side of the bed. The doctor was standing by the bed on
the opposite side. Catherine looked at me and smiled. I bent down over
the bed and started to cry.
“Poor darling,” Catherine said very softly. She looked gray.
“You’re all right, Cat,” I said. “You’re going to be all right.”
“I’m going to die,” she said; then waited and said, “I hate it.”
I took her hand.
“Don’t touch me,” she said. I let go of her hand. She smiled. “Poor
darling. You touch me all you want.”
“You’ll be all right, Cat. I know you’ll be all right.”
“I meant to write you a letter to have if anything happened, but I
didn’t do it.”
“Do you want me to get a priest or any one to come and see you?”
“Just you,” she said. Then a little later, “I’m not afraid. I just hate
it.”
“You must not talk so much,” the doctor said.
“All right,” Catherine said.
“Do you want me to do anything, Cat? Can I get you anything?”
Catherine smiled, “No.” Then a little later, “You won’t do our things
with another girl, or say the same things, will you?”
“Never.”
“I want you to have girls, though.”
“I don’t want them.”
“You are talking too much,” the doctor said. “Mr. Henry must go out. He
can come back again later. You are not going to die. You must not be
silly.”
“All right,” Catherine said. “I’ll come and stay with you nights,” she
said. It was very hard for her to talk.
“Please go out of the room,” the doctor said. “You cannot talk.”
Catherine winked at me, her face gray. “I’ll be right outside,” I said.
“Don’t worry, darling,” Catherine said. “I’m not a bit afraid. It’s just
a dirty trick.”
“You dear, brave sweet.”
I waited outside in the hall. I waited a long time. The nurse came to
the door and came over to me. “I’m afraid Mrs. Henry is very ill,” she
said. “I’m afraid for her.”
“Is she dead?”
“No, but she is unconscious.”
It seems she had one hemorrhage after another. They couldn’t stop it. I
went into the room and stayed with Catherine until she died. She was
unconscious all the time, and it did not take her very long to die.
Outside the room, in the hall, I spoke to the doctor, “is there anything
I can do to-night?”
“No. There is nothing to do. Can I take you to your hotel?”
“No, thank you. I am going to stay here a while.”
“I know there is nothing to say. I cannot tell you——”
“No,” I said. “There’s nothing to say.”
“Good-night,” he said. “I cannot take you to your hotel?”
“No, thank you.”
“It was the only thing to do,” he said. “The operation proved——”
“I do not want to talk about it,” I said.
“I would like to take you to your hotel.”
“No, thank you.”
He went down the hall. I went to the door of the room.
“You can’t come in now,” one of the nurses said.
“Yes I can,” I said.
“You can’t come in yet.”
“You get out,” I said. “The other one too.”
But after I had got them out and shut the door and turned off the light
it wasn’t any good. It was like saying good-by to a statue. After a
while I went out and left the hospital and walked back to the hotel in
the rain.
THE END
TRANSCRIBER NOTES
Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected. Where multiple
spellings occur, majority use has been employed.
Punctuation has been maintained except where obvious printer errors
occur.
[The end of _A Farewell to Arms_ by Ernest Hemingway]