that I wanted to release you? I did it because it was the only thing an
honourable man could do and I wouldn't let pity for me hold you to a
promise made in love. It wasn't that I didn't want you. I've wanted you
every day and every hour. Only God knows how I've wanted you and shall
want you all the rest of my life, unless--"
He paused, hoping, for the space of a heartbeat, that the dream might
come true.
But Isabel did not move from her chair. She surveyed the opposite wall
for a few moments before she spoke. "It was honourable," she said, in a
more friendly tone. "Of course it was the only thing you could do."
"Of course," he echoed, bitterly.
Isabel rose, went to the foot of the bed, and leaned upon it, facing
him. "I'm afraid I've stayed too long," she said. "I think I'd better
go. I can wait downstairs for the carriage."
Allison did not answer. His eyes burned strangely in his white face,
making her vaguely uncomfortable and afraid. She turned the diamond ring
upon her finger and slowly slipped it off.
"I suppose I must give this back," she said, reluctantly. "I mustn't
wear it now."
"Why not?" he asked huskily.
"Because it doesn't mean anything--now."
"It never did. Keep it, Isabel."
"Thank you," she said, calmly, putting it back, but on the middle
finger. "I must go now. I hope you'll get along all right."
"Wait just a minute, please." He rang a bell that was on a table within
his reach, and the nurse came in. "Please bring me my violin."
Isabel turned to the door but was held back by a peremptory command.
"Wait!"
"Here," he cried shrilly, offering Isabel the violin. "Take this, too!"
"What for?" she asked, curiously. "I can't play."
"Nevertheless, it belongs to you. Keep it, as a souvenir!"
Holding the violin awkwardly, Isabel backed out of the room, the nurse
following her and closing the door. The nurse was a young woman who had
not sacrificed her normal human sympathy to her chosen work, but had
managed, happily, to combine the two. She watched Isabel disdainfully as
she went down-stairs, very briskly for one with a sprained ankle.
"God!" said Allison, aloud. "Oh, God in Heaven!"
Then the nurse turned away in pity, for behind the closed door she heard
a grown man sobbing like a hurt child.
XVII
PENANCE
The Crosby twins had gone home very quietly, after doing all they could
to help Colonel Kent and Madame Bernard. "The Yellow Peril" chugged
along at the lowest speed with all its gaudy banners torn down. Neither
spoke until they passed the spot where the red touring car lay on its
side in the ditch, and four or five dogs, still hungry and hopeful,
wrangled over a few bare bones.
Juliet was sniffing audibly, and, as soon as she saw the wreck, burst
into tears. "Oh, Romie," she sobbed, "if he's dead, we've killed him!"
Romeo swallowed a lump in his throat, winked hard, and roughly advised
Juliet to "shut up."
When the machine was safely in the barn, and all the scattered dogs
collected and imprisoned, Romeo came in, ready to talk it over. "We've
got to do something," he said, "but I don't know what it is."
"Oh, Romie," cried Juliet with a fresh burst of tears, "do you think
they'll hang us? We're murderers!"
Romeo considered for a moment before he answered. "We aren't murderers,
because we didn't go to do it. They won't hang us--but they ought to,"
he added, remorsefully.
"What can we do?" mourned Juliet. "Oh, what can we do?"
"Well, we can pay all the bills for one thing--that's a good start. To-
morrow, I'll see about getting that car out of the ditch and taking care
of it."
"Somebody may steal it," she suggested.
"Not if we guard it. One or both of us ought to sit by it until we can
get it into the barn."
Juliet wiped her eyes. "That's right. We'll guard it all night to-night
and while we're guarding it, we'll talk it all over and decide what to
do."
The dinner of unwholesome delicacies which they had planned as the last
feature of the day's celebration was hesitatingly renounced. "We don't
deserve to have anything at all to eat," said Juliet. "What is it that
they feed prisoners on?"
"Bread and water--black bread?"
"Where could we get black bread?"
"I don't know. I never saw any."
After discussing a penitential menu for some time, they finally decided
to live upon mush and milk for the present, and, if Allison should die,
forever. "We can warm it in the winter," said Romeo, "and it won't be so
bad."
When their frugal repast was finished, they instinctively changed their
festal garments for the sober attire of every day. Romeo brought in two
lanterns and Juliet pasted red tissue paper around them, so that they
might serve as warning signals of the wreck. At sunset, they set forth,
each with a blanket and a lantern to do sentry duty by the capsized car.
"Oughtn't we to have a dog or two?" queried Romeo, as they trudged down
the road. "Watchmen always have dogs."
"We oughtn't to have anything that would make it any easier for us to
watch, and besides, the dogs weren't to blame. They don't need to sit up
with us--let 'em have their sleep."
"All right," Romeo grunted. "Shall we divide the night into watches and
one of us sit on the car while the other walks?"
"No, we'll watch together, and we won't sit on the car--we'll sit on the
cold, damp ground. If we take cold and die it will only serve us right."
"We can't take cold in June," objected Romeo, "with two blankets."
"Unless it rains."
"It won't rain tonight," he said, gloomily; "look at the stars!"
The sky was clear, and pale stars shone faintly in the afterglow. There
was not even a light breeze--the world was as still and calm as though
pain and death were unknown.
When they reached the scene of the accident, Romeo set the two red
lanterns at the point where the back of the car touched the road. They
spread one blanket on the grass at the other side of the road and sat
down to begin their long vigil. Romeo planned to go home to breakfast at
sunrise and bring Juliet some of the mush and milk left from supper.
Then, while she continued to watch the machine, he would go into town
and make arrangements for its removal.
"Is there room in our barn for both cars?" she asked.
"No. Ours will have to come out."
Juliet shuddered. "I never want to see it again."
"Neither do I."
"Can we sell it?"
"We ought not to sell it unless we gave him the money. We shouldn't have
it ourselves."
"Then," suggested Juliet, "why don't we give it away and give him just
as much as it cost, including our suits and the dogs' collars and
everything?"
"We have no right to give away a man-killer. 'The Yellow Peril' is
cursed."
"Let's sacrifice it," she cried. "Let's make a funeral pyre in the yard
and burn it, and our suits and the dogs' collars and everything. Let's
burn everything we've got that we care for!"
"All right," agreed Romeo, uplifted by the zeal of the true martyr.
"And," he added, regretfully, "I'll shoot all the dogs and bury 'em in
one long trench. I don't want to see anything again that was in it."
"I don't either," returned Juliet. She wondered whether she should
permit the wholesale execution of the herd, since it was a thing she had
secretly desired for a long time. "You mustn't shoot Minerva and the
puppies," she continued, as her strict sense of justice asserted itself,
"because she wasn't in it. She was at home taking care of her children
and they'd die if she should be shot now."
So it was settled that Minerva, who had taken no part in the fatal
celebration, should be spared, with her innocent babes.
"And in a few years more," said Romeo, hopefully, "we'll have lots more
dogs, though probably not as many as we've got now."
Juliet sighed heavily but was in honour bound to make no objections, for
long ago, when they arbitrated the dog question, it was written in the
covenant that no dogs should be imported or none killed, except by
mutual consent. And Minerva had five puppies, and if each of the five
should follow the maternal example, and if each of those should do
likewise--Juliet fairly lost her head in a maze of mental arithmetic.
"We ought to go into deep mourning," Romeo was saying.
"I've been thinking of that. We should repent in sackcloth and ashes,
only I don't know what sackcloth is."
"I guess it's that rough brown stuff they make potato bags of."
"Burlap?"
"Yes. But we haven't many ashes at this time of year and we'll have
still less if we live on mush and milk."
"Maybe we could get ashes somewhere," she said, thoughtfully.
"We'd have to, because it would take us over a year to get enough to
repent in."
"There'll be ashes left from the automobile and the suits, and if you
can get enough potato bags, I'll fix 'em so we can wear 'em at the
sacrifice and afterwards we can buy deep mourning."
"All right, but you mustn't make pretty suits."
"I couldn't, out of potato bags. They'll have to be plain--very plain."
"The first thing is to get this car into our barn, and write and tell
Colonel Kent where it is. Then we'll get our black clothes, and then
we'll shoot the dogs and bury 'em, and then we'll have the sacrifice,
and then--"
"And then," repeated Juliet.
"Then we'll have to go and tell 'em all what we've done, and offer to
pay all the bills, and give 'em the price of the car besides for
damages."
"Oh, Romie," cried Juliet, with a shudder, "we don't have to go and tell
'em, do we? We don't have to take strangers into our consciences, do
we?"
"Certainly," replied Romeo, sternly. "Just because we don't want to do
it is why we've got to. We've got to do hard things when we make a
sacrifice. Lots of people think they're charitable if they give away
their old clothes and things they don't want. It isn't charity to give
away things you want to get rid of and it isn't a sacrifice to do things
you don't mind doing. The harder it is and the more we don't want to do
it, the better sacrifice."
His logic was convincing, but Juliet drooped visibly. The bent little
figure on the blanket was pathetic, but the twins were not given to
self-pity. As time went on, the conversation lagged. They had both had a
hard day, from more than one standpoint, and it was not surprising that
by midnight, the self-appointed sentries were sound asleep upon one
blanket, with Romeo's coat for a pillow and the other blanket tucked
around them.
The red lanterns burned faithfully until almost dawn, then smoked and
went out, leaving an unpleasant odour that lasted until sunrise. The
rumble of a distant cart woke them, and they sat up, shamefacedly
rubbing their eyes.
"Oh," cried Juliet, conscience-stricken, "we went to sleep! We went to
sleep on duty! How could we?"
"Dunno," returned Romeo, with a frank yawn. "Guess we were tired.
Anyhow, the machine is all right."
When the milkman came in sight, they hailed him and purchased a quart of
milk. He was scarcely surprised to see them, for the Crosbys were widely
known to be eccentric, and presently he drove on. His query about the
wrecked car had passed unnoticed.
"If you'll stay here, Jule," said Romeo, wiping his mouth, "I'll go and
get a team and some rope and we'll get the car in."
"Can't I go too?"
"No, you stay here. It's bad enough to sleep at your post without
deserting it."
"You slept, too," retorted Juliet, quickly on the defensive, "and I'm a
girl."
"Huh!" he sneered. The claim of feminine privilege invariably disgusted
him beyond words.
"Suppose people come by--" Juliet faltered; "and--ask--questions."
"Answer 'em," advised Romeo, briefly. "Tell 'em we've killed a man and
are going to suffer for it. We deserve to have everybody know it."
But, fortunately for Juliet's quicker sensibilities, no one passed by in
the hour Romeo was gone. He came from the nearest farm with an adequate
number of assistants and such primitive machinery as was at hand. The
car was not badly damaged and was finally towed into the Crosbys' barn.
Then they went into the house and composed a letter to Colonel Kent, but
put off copying and sending it until they should be able to get black
bordered stationery.
Two weeks later, clad in deepest mourning, the twins trudged into town.
At Colonel Kent's there was no one in authority to receive them and
their errand was of too much importance to be communicated to either
physician or nurse. Their own unopened letter lay on the library table,
with many others.
Subdued and chastened in demeanour, they went to Madame Bernard's and
waited in funereal silence until Madame came down.
"How do you--" she began, then stopped. "Why, what is the matter?"
"We ran over him," explained Romeo, suggestively inclining his head in
the general direction of Kent's. "Don't you remember?"
"And if he dies, we've killed him," put in Juliet, sadly.
"We'll be murderers if he dies," Romeo continued, "and we ought to be
hung."
In spite of her own depression and deep anxiety, Madame saw how keenly
the tragedy had affected the twins. "Why, my dears!" she cried. "Do you
think for a minute that anybody in the world blames you?"
"We ought to be blamed," Romeo returned, "because we did it."
"But not on purpose--you couldn't help it."
"We could have helped it," said Juliet, "by not celebrating. We had no
business to buy an automobile, or, even if we had, we shouldn't have
gone out in it until we learned to run it."
"That's like staying away from the water until you have learned to
swim," answered Madame, comfortingly, "and Allison isn't going to die."
"Really? Do you mean it? Are you sure? How do you know?" The words came
all at once, in a jumble of eager questions.
"Because he isn't. The worst that could possibly happen to him would be
the loss of his left hand, and his father is looking all over the
country for some surgeon who can save it."
"I'd rather die than to have my hand cut off," said Juliet, in a small,
thin voice.
"So would I," added Romeo.
"We're all hoping for the best," Madame went on, "and you must hope,
too. Nobody has thought of blaming you, so you mustn't feel so badly
about it. Even Allison himself wouldn't want you to feel badly."
"But we do," Romeo answered, "in spite of all the sacrifices and
everything."
"Sacrifices," repeated Madame, wonderingly, "why, what do you mean?"
"We did sentry duty all night by his car," Romeo explained, "and we're
taking care of it in our barn."
"And we've lived on mush and milk ever since," Juliet added.
"I shot all the dogs but the one with the puppies," said Romeo.
"She wasn't in it, you know," Juliet continued. "I helped dig the trench
and we buried the whole nineteen end to end by the fence, with their new
collars on."
"Then we burned the automobile," resumed Romeo. "We soaked it in
kerosene, and put our suits into the back seat--our caps and goggles and
everything. We took out all the pieces of iron and steel and gave 'em to
the junk man, and then we repented in sackcloth and ashes."
"How so?" queried Madame, with a faint glimmer of amusement in her sad
eyes.
"Juliet made suits out of potato sacks--very plain suits--and we put 'em
on to repent in."
"We went and stood in the ashes," put in Juliet, "while they were so hot
that they hurt our feet, and Romie raised his right hand and said 'I
repent' and then I did the same."
"And after the ashes got cold, we sat down in 'em and rubbed 'em into
the sackcloth and our hair and all over our faces and hands."
"All the time saying 'I repent! I repent!'" continued Juliet, soberly.
"And then we went into mourning," concluded Romeo.
Madame's heart throbbed with tender pity for the stricken twins, but she
wisely said nothing.
"Can you think of anything more we could do, or any more sacrifices we
could make?" inquired Juliet, ready to atone in full measure.
"Indeed I can't," Madame replied, truthfully. "I think you've done
everything that could be expected of you."
"We wrote to the Colonel," said Romeo, "but he hasn't got it yet. We saw
it on the library table. We want to pay all the bills."
"And give Allison as much money as we spent on the automobile and for
the suits and everything, and pay for fixing up his car," interrupted
Juliet.
"We want to do everything," Romeo said, with marked emphasis.
"Everything," echoed Juliet.
"That's very nice of you," answered Madame, kindly, "and we all
appreciate it."
The stem young faces of the twins relaxed ever so little. It was a great
relief to discover that they were not objects of scorn and loathing, for
they had brooded over the accident until they had become morbid.
"Did you say that you had been living upon mush and milk ever since?"
asked Madame.
"Ever since," they answered, together.
"I'm sure that's long enough," she said. "I wouldn't do it any longer.
Won't you stay to dinner with us?"
With one accord the twins rose, impelled by a single impulse toward
departure.
"We couldn't," said Romeo.
"We mustn't," explained Juliet. Then, with belated courtesy, she added:
"Thank you, just the same."
They made their adieux awkwardly and went home, greatly eased in mind.
As they trudged along the dusty road, they occasionally sighed in
relief, but said little until they reached their ancestral abode,
dogless now save for the pups gambolling about the doorstep and Minerva
watching them with maternal pride.
"She said we'd lived on mush and milk long enough," said Romeo,
pensively.
"We might fry the mush," Juliet suggested.
"And have butter and maple syrup on it?"
"Maybe."
"And drink the milk, and have bread, too?"
"I guess so."
"And jam?"
"Not while we're in mourning," said Juliet, firmly. "We can have syrup
on our bread."
"That's just as good."
"If you think so, you ought not to have it."
"We've got to feed ourselves, or we'll die," he objected vigorously,
"and if we're dead, we won't be any good to him or to anybody else, and
we can't ever repent any more."
"I'm not so sure about that." said Juliet, with sinister emphasis.
"Nothing will happen to us that we don't deserve," Romeo assured her,
"so come on and let's have jam. If it makes us sick, it's wrong, and if
it doesn't, it's all right."
The following day, they voluntarily returned to their mush and milk, for
they had eaten too much jam, and, having been very ill in the night,
considered it sufficient evidence that their penance was not yet over.
XVIII
"LESS THAN THE DUST"
The heat of August shimmered over the land, and still, to every inquiry
at the door or telephone, the quiet young woman in blue and white said:
"No change." Allison was listless and apathetic, yet comparatively free
from pain.
Life, for him, had ebbed back to the point where the tide must either
cease or turn. He knew neither hunger nor thirst nor weariness; only the
great pause of soul and body, the sense of the ultimate goal.
One by one, he meditated upon the things he used to care for. Isabel
came first, but her youth and beauty had ceased to trouble or to beckon.
His father had gone on ahead. The delusion still persisted, but he spoke
of it no more. Even the violin did not matter now. He remembered the
endless hours he had spent at work, almost every day of his life for
years, and to what end? In an instant, it had been rendered empty,
purposeless, and vain--like life itself.
Occasionally a new man came to look at his hand; not from the city now,
but from towns farther inland. The examinations were painful, of course,
but he made no objections. After the man had gone, he could count the
slow, distinct pulsations that marked the ebbing of the pain, but never
troubled himself to ask either the doctor or the nurse what the new man
had said about it. He no longer cared.
Aunt Francesca had not come--nor Rose. Perhaps they were dead, also. He
asked the nurse one sultry afternoon if they were dead.
"No," she assured him; "nobody is dead."
He wondered, fretfully, why she should take the trouble to lie to him so
persistently upon this one point. Then a cunning scheme came into his
mind. It presented itself mechanically to him as a trap for the nurse.
If they were dead, she could not produce them instantly alive, as a
conjurer takes animals from an apparently empty box. If he demanded that
she should bring them to him, or even one, it would prove his point and
let her see that he knew how she was trying to deceive him.
"Have they gone away?" he inquired.
"No, they're still there."
"Then," said Allison, with the air of one scoring a fine point, "will
you ask-well--ask Miss Bernard to come over and see me?"
Remembering the other woman who had come in response to his request, and
the disastrous effect the visit had had upon her patient she hesitated.
"I'm afraid you're not strong enough," she said kindly. "Can't you wait
a little longer?"
"There," he cried. "I knew they were dead!"
As she happened to be both wise and kind, the young woman hesitated no
longer. "If I brought you a note from her you would believe me, wouldn't
you?"
"No," he replied, stubbornly.
"Isn't there any way you would know, without seeing her?"
He considered for a few moments. "I'd know if I heard her play," he said
at length. "There's no one who could play just the way she does."
"Suppose I ask her to come over sometimes and play the piano downstairs
for a few minutes at a time, very softly. Would you like that?"
"Yes--that is, I don't mind." He was sure, now, that his trap was in
working order, for no one could deceive him at the piano--he would
recognise Rose at the first chord.
"Excuse me just a minute, please." She returned presently with the news
that Rose would come as soon as she could. "Can't you go to sleep now?"
she suggested.
Allison smiled ironically. How transparent she was!
She wanted him to go to sleep and when he awoke, she would tell him that
Rose had been there, and had played, and had just gone.
"No," he answered, "I don't want to go to sleep. I want to hear Rose
play."
So he waited, persistently wide awake. Sharpened by illness and pain,
his hearing was phenomenally acute; so much so that even a whisper in
the next room was distinctly audible. He heard the distant rumble of
wheels, approaching steadily, and wondered why the house did not tremble
when the carriage stopped. He heard the lower door open softly, then
close, a quick, light step in the living room, the old-fashioned piano
stool whirling on its rusty axis, then a few slow, deep chords prefacing
a familiar bit of Chopin.
He turned to the nurse, who sat in her low rocking-chair at the window.
"I beg your pardon. I thought you were not telling me the truth."
The young woman only smiled in answer. "Listen!"
From downstairs the music came softly. Rose was playing with the
exquisite taste and feeling that characterised everything she did. She
purposely avoided the extremes of despair and joy, keeping to the safe
middle-ground. Living waters murmured through the melody, the sea surged
and crooned, flying clouds went through blue, sunny spaces, and birds
sang, ever with an unfailing uplift, as of many wings.
Allison's calmness insensibly changed, not in degree, but in quality, as
the piano magically brought before him green distances lying fair
beneath the warm sun, clover-scented meadows and blossoming boughs.
"Life," he said to himself; "life more abundant."
She drifted from one thing to another, playing snatches of old songs,
woven together by modulations of her own making. At last she paused to
think of something else, but her fingers remembered, and began, almost
of their own accord:
[Illustration: musical notation.]
Allison stirred restlessly, as he recalled how he had heard it before.
He saw the drifted petals of fallen roses, the moon-shadow on the dial,
hours wrong, the spangled cobwebs in the grass and the other spangles,
changed to faint iridescence in the enchanted light as Isabel came
toward him and into his open arms. Could marble respond to a lover's
passion, could dead lips answer with love for love, then Isabel might
have yielded to him at least a tolerant tenderness. He saw her now,
alien and apart, like some pale star that shone upon a barren waste, but
never for him.
Another phrase, full of love and longing, floated up the stairway and
entered his room, a guest unbidden.
[Illustration: musical notation.]
He turned to the nurse. "Ask Miss Bernard to come up for a few minutes,
will you?"
"Do you think it's wise?" she temporised.
"Please ask her to come up," he said, imperatively. "Must I call her
myself?"
So Rose came up, after receiving the customary caution not to stay too
long and avoid everything that might be unpleasant or exciting.