The management had given her the use of a small suite on the second
floor. The door to her parlor was ajar, and I heard voices. I knocked,
and she called to me to come in.
There were the two reporters, hats in hand. Heloise was standing by the
table. She was pale, but very erect and composed. She had put on a black
tailored suit. It was this, perhaps, that emphasized the ivory whiteness
of her skin, and subdued the blue in her eyes.
I think she saw on my face indications that I was about to speak
indiscreetly. For I was. The sight of the reporters in that room, trying
to pin Heloise down to the details of this dreadful story, angered me.
But before I could utter a word she took command of the situation.
“Forgive me for calling you in this peremptory way, Mr. Eckhart,” she
said, “but I cannot talk to these men. You were good enough to offer to
help, and, since I am alone here, I am forced to take you at your word.”
Then she turned to the reporters, adding, “Mr. Eckhart knew my husband.
You will please talk with him.”
Her voice was steady; but my quick eye caught a familiar, listless
gesture of her left hand as she finished.
“But, Mrs. Crocker,” persisted the older man, “it has been said that--”
I threw the door wide, and sprang directly in front of Heloise, facing
the reporter.
[Illustration: 0309]
“Get out!” I said.
He frowned, but backed toward the door, as I advanced on him. Thus I got
them out into the corridor. I was all ablaze. But at the door I turned
for one brief glance at Heloise. Her lips were compressed. She gave me
a swift look of warning. This steadied me. I closed the door, and walked
down the corridor after the reporters.
“Come downstairs,” I said, “and ask your questions of me.”
So I myself came nearer to an outbreak than have any of the others. But
I shall not lose my head again. And after one or two days, Hind-mann
tells me, the news value of the episode will have flattened out, and
they will let us alone.
_April 16th. Morning,_
|WE are going down to Tientsin on the forenoon train for the funeral.
Then back here before night.
Heloise herself has seen to all the little necessary arrangements. She
had me get what few flowers I could last night. And I believe we can get
more in Tientsin. She wants to do everything she can for his memory in
these last hours.
I think she is very fine about it. She exhibits no weakness. She shirks
neither from what she regards as her duty in this tragic time nor from
the results of her own acts. It has all come back to her, of course, in
a thousand memory-shapes. It must have. But she does not speak of that.
The Minister sent over a large bunch of lilac blossoms last night, cut
from the bushes in the Legation compound.
_April 17th._
|WE came back to Peking on the late afternoon train--Heloise, Hindmann
and I. But Hindmann stayed in the smoking car most of the way.
Heloise and I sat in our compartment without saying much of anything.
The sober spell of the funeral service was on us both. I bought some
magazines at Tientsin, and laid them on the seat close to her hand. She
picked one up, and turned the pages, but without much interest. In a few
moments she laid it aside. Most of the way she rested her head back in
the corner of the seat and watched the little brick stations flit by,
and the Chinese farms with their mud-walled compounds.
After a time I went forward and joined Hindmann. I thought Heloise would
be glad of a little solitude. Then there was a chance that she might
sleep a little. But I don't believe she did, for when I looked in on
her, half an hour later, she was sitting forward, chin on hand,
studying the flat brown countryside with its occasional squares of green
millet-spears.
She gave me a faint smile.
“Don't go away again,” she said, her eyes back on the brown and green
fields and the dingy gray compounds.
And since she was not looking at me, and seemed not to expect a reply, I
just dropped down opposite her and myself gazed out the window.
After a little she spoke again, with some uncertainty in her voice.
“I'll move my things back to our little hotel--first, Anthony.”