My first step on leaving Homewood was to seek a public telephone.
Calling up Doctor Pool in Yonkers, I assured him that he might rest easy
as to the young patient to whose doubtful condition he had called my
attention. That she was in good hands and was doing well. That I had
seen her and would give him all necessary particulars when I came to
interview him later in the day. To his uneasy questions I vouchsafed
little reply. I was by no means sure of the advisability of taking him
into my full confidence. It was enough for him to know that his demands
had been complied with without injury to the child.
Before hanging up the receiver, I put him a question on my own behalf.
How was the boy in his charge? The growl he returned me was very
non-committal, and afforded me some food for thought as I turned back to
Mrs. Carew's cottage, where I now proposed to make a final visit.
I entered from the road. The heavily wooded grounds looked desolate. The
copper beeches which are the glory of the place seemed to have lost
color since I last saw them above the intervening hedges. Even the
house, as it gradually emerged to view through the close shrubbery, wore
a different aspect from usual. In another moment I saw why. Every
shutter was closed and not a vestige of life was visible above or below.
Startled, for I had not expected quite so hasty a departure on her part,
I ran about to the side door where I had previously entered and rang fit
to wake the dead. Only solitary echoes came from within and I was about
to curse the time I had lost in telephoning to Doctor Pool, when I heard
a slight sound in the direction of the private path, and, leaping
hastily to the opening, caught the glimpse of something or somebody
disappearing down the first flight of steps.
Did I run? You may believe I did, at least till I had descended the
first terrace; then my steps grew gradually wary and finally ceased; for
I could hear voices ahead of me on the second terrace to which I had
now come, and these voices came from persons standing still. If I rushed
on I should encounter these persons, and this was undesirable. I
accordingly paused just short of the top, and so heard what raised the
moment into one of tragic importance.
One of the speakers was Mrs. Carew--there was no doubting this--the
other was Mr. Rathbone. From no other lips than his could I hope to hear
words uttered with such intensity, though he was guarded in his speech,
or thought he was, which is not always the same thing.
He was pleading with her, and my heart stood still with the sense of
threatening catastrophe as I realized the attitude of the pair. He, as
every word showed, was still ignorant of Gwendolen's fate, consequently
of the identity of the child who I had every reason to believe was at
that very moment fluttering a few steps below in the care of the colored
maid, whose voice I could faintly hear; she, with his passion to meet
and quell, had this secret to maintain; hearing his wild entreaties with
one ear and listening for the possible outbursts of the
not-to-be-restrained child with the other; mad to go--to catch her train
before discovery overwhelmed her, yet not daring to hasten him, for his
mood was a man's mood and not to be denied. I felt sorry for her, and
cast about in my mind what aid to give the situation, when the passion
of his words seized me, and I forgot her position in the interest I
began to feel in his.
"Valerie, Valerie," he was saying, "this is cruelty. You go with no good
cause that I can see--put the sea between us, and yet say no word to
make the parting endurable. You understand what I suffer--my hateful
thoughts, my dread, which is not so much dread as--Oh, that I should say
it! Oh, that I should feel it!--hope; guilty, unpardonable hope. Yet you
refuse me the little word, the kindly look, which would alleviate the
oppression of my feelings and give me the thought of you to counteract
this eternal brooding upon Gwendolen and her possible fate. I want a
promise--conditional, O God! but yet a promise; and you simply bid me to
have patience; to wait--as if a man could wait who sees his love, his
life, his future trembling in the balance against the fate of a little
child. If you loved me--"
"Hush!" The feeling in that word was not for him. I felt it at once; it
was for her secret, threatened every instant she lingered there by some
move, by some word which might escape a thoughtless child. "You do not
understand me, Justin. You talk with no comprehension of myself or of
the event. Six months from now, if all goes well, you will see that I
have been kind, not cruel. I can not say any more; I should not have
said so much. Go back, dear friend, and let me take the train with
Harry. The sea is not impassable. We shall meet again, and then--" Did
she pause to look behind her down those steps--to make some gesture of
caution to the uneasy child? "you will forgive me for what seems cruelty
to you now. I can not do differently. With all the world weeping over
the doubtful fate of this little child, you can not expect me to--to
make any promise conditional upon her _death_."
The man's cry drove the irony of the situation out of my mind.
"Puerilities! all puerilities. A man's life--soul--are worth some
sacrifices. If you loved me--" A quick ingathering of his breath, then a
low moan, then the irrepressible cry she vainly sought to hush, "O
Valerie, you are silent! You do not love me! Two years of suffering! two
years of repression, then this delirium of hope, of possibility, and you
_silent_! I will trouble you no more. Gwendolen alive or Gwendolen dead,
what is it to me! I--"
[Illustration: "HUSH! THERE IS NO DOUBT ON THAT TOPIC; THE CHILD IS
DEAD. LET THAT BE UNDERSTOOD BETWEEN US."]
"Hush! there is no doubt on that topic; the child is _dead_. Let that be
understood between us." This was whispered, and whispered very low, but
the air seemed breathless at that moment and I heard her. "This is my
last word to you. You will have your fortune, whether you have my love
or not. Remember that, and--"
"Auntie, make Dinah move away; I want to see the man you are talking
to."
Gwendolen had spoken.