ANNE'S VIGIL
As the car swerved from the curb, Anne sank against the cushions.
Turning to the immobile figure at her side, she questioned anxiously.
"Is Alexis--is Mr. Petrovskey very ill?"
The shadowy form retained its frozen quiescence.
"He is perhaps dying," said the light, harsh voice.
"Oh!" Anne's cry was involuntary. Conscious of the flood of hatred
beating against her, she steeled herself. When she spoke her voice was
well under control.
"Surely you can't mean that! Why, what is the matter?"
The delicate profile beside her, momentarily illuminated by a street
lamp, acquired the translucent hardness of carved, white jade. "He has
pneumonia." Once more in shadow, the mask turned towards Anne. A pair of
eyes gleamed from out of dark caverns. "It developed several days ago.
He had had a bad cough for about two weeks, and of course had taken no
care of it." The dull voice ceased.
Beneath her fur cape, Anne clasped gloved hands convulsively together.
"Oh, poor boy, and he never let me know!" she murmured contritely. She
faced with shame a thrill of relief. So Alexis had not neglected her
wilfully after all.
"Where is he now? Is he--alone?"
The answer came deliberately, from averted lips.
"Yes, he is in his apartment in Gramercy Park. He is alone with the
exception of a day and night nurse. He--he prefers it that way." She
faltered for the first time, then continued with a resumption of
hardness. "Women have always been superfluous to Alexis. I have heard
all geniuses are the same."
The sheer, foolish bravado of it pierced Anne's heart. The impulse to
put her arms about the proud, suffering, little creature was almost
irresistible, but she repelled it scornfully. Why cheapen the child's
dignity by histrionics? This was obviously neither the time nor place
for explanations. Let those come later. The important thing at present
was to get to Alexis as quickly as possible, and with as little
friction. So she said nothing, but gazed steadily at the stream of
motors which glutted Park Avenue like an endless chain of monster
glowworms.
Without turning perceptibly, Claire cast a surreptitious glance in her
direction. In the constant glare from passing motors, Anne emerged,
doubly magnificent in regal furs, and jeweled band glowing within the
copper meshes of her hair, the proud face of a patrician, charmingly
insolent, utterly non-committal. Beside her, Claire felt smitten with
mediocrity as with a hopeless disease. And yet it was she herself who
was bringing this woman to Alexis. Why not? He desired her. Perhaps his
very life depended upon her presence. When existence narrowed down to a
primal factor such as death, one shed all fears except one. Her eyes
fixed upon Anne, she suddenly laughed aloud.
"I startled you, didn't I?" she said harshly, in response to Anne's look
of surprise, "but the mirthfulness of the occasion suddenly overcame me.
It--it is funny, isn't it? Just----" her voice faltered ever so
slightly, "just like the movies?"
Anne looked back at her gently. "I doubt if real life could ever be as
complicated as Hollywood imagines, don't you?" she replied impersonally.
Bitterly ashamed of her outburst, Claire was about to reply with the
same aloofness, when the motor turned into 21st Street and glided toward
Gramercy Square. It stopped before a tall, narrow house with an English
basement.
"Are we there?" asked Anne.
Her face fiery with chagrin, Claire nodded laconically.
They mounted in the elevator and were admitted into the studio by Mme.
Petrovskey.
"This is very good of you to take pity upon my poor boy," said a suave
voice.
Anne felt herself drawn swiftly into the room. An inscrutable China-doll
face gazed blankly into her own.
"Not at all," she replied quietly. "I am distressed to hear of your
son's illness and only hope I shall be of some use."
The small, blue eyes urbanely veiled, were fixed upon Anne's face.
"I'm afraid you're too modest," continued the bland voice. Dislike,
tinged with a hint of curiosity lurked beneath the perfect manner. "The
doctor seems to think you are necessary for my son's recovery, and we,
his wife and mother," the eyes ceased to bore through Anne momentarily
and swept ironically over Claire's shrinking figure, "are only too
grateful." She came a little nearer and laid a massive hand on Anne's
cloak. "Perhaps you'd better keep your wrap on. The sick-room is very
cold, and you're not exactly dressed for the occasion, are you, dear
lady?"
"Perhaps not," replied Anne, a frozen anger accumulating in her voice.
"You see I was on my way to the theater. But isn't this delay
unnecessary, Mme. Petrovskey? Won't you please take me in to your son?
That is, if the doctor permits?"
Perfect urbanity descended once more upon Mme. Petrovskey.
"Certainly," she said in brisk, business-like tones. "Just wait a minute
and I'll call the nurse."
She crossed the large studio with ponderous agility and tapped upon a
glass paneled door. It opened just enough to permit the emerging of a
white-capped head. Whispered words were exchanged, and Anne was beckoned
forward.
With a glance of commiseration for Claire, who had sunk into a chair
next the wall and was leaning forward like a broken thing, Anne passed
by her swiftly.
The next moment she knelt at Alexis's bedside.
Emaciated, a spot of crimson beneath each glowing eye, his labored
breathing filled the room with tragic effort. Suppressing a cry of pity,
Anne took one of the burning hands and held it between her cool palms,
as if to quench the inward fire. But the glittering eyes, as they fell
upon her, held no gleam of recognition. The monotonous agony of ingoing
and outgoing breath continued as before.
"Will he die?" she whispered to the nurse who had closed the door upon
Mme. Petrovskey, and tiptoed back again to the bedside.
The woman looked non-committal. In the shaded glare from the night
light, green rings about her eyes cut into her face like spherical
eclipses.
"If the fever goes down he ought to live," she said. "The congestion in
the lung is bad, but so far has not spread to the other. If the cause of
cerebral excitement can be removed"--her eyes rested upon Anne
curiously--"he will probably get well."
"He doesn't seem to be particularly excited? I understood that----" Anne
broke off in some confusion, and then continued sturdily, "that he had
been asking for me?"
The nurse nodded.
"Oh, he has asked for you! That is, he has asked for some lady named
'Anne' almost constantly, and I suppose that means you? You see he has
his quiet moments, and this is one of them. A sort of unconsciousness,
you know. I guess it's Nature's way of giving him a rest."
"How long do these periods usually last?"
"Anywhere from ten minutes to an hour. You'd better stay all night. I'll
make up the daybed for you in the studio. The doctor will be here soon
again and will probably want to talk things over with you. If you can
only be here when one of his spells comes on, it may make all the
difference!"
"Very well." Anne put Alexis' hand back on to the cover and rose to her
feet. "I will stay, of course. If you'll show me where the telephone is,
I'll call up my maid and have her send me a few necessary things for the
night. By the way," she hesitated a moment as she reached the door, "are
the other two ladies spending the night here also?"
The nurse looked surprised.
"Oh no, ma'am. They always go home at night. They've probably left
already. The telephone's right in the studio by the front door. Yes,
that's it."
So they had gone! With a sensation of reprieve, Anne crossed the empty
room quickly and got into communication with Regina.
Half an hour later she was installed in the raised alcove off the
studio.
But it would be days before Anne would see her own house again. Days in
which she and the doctor and the nurse would wrestle with fiery death
for the life of Alexis Petrovskey.