CLAIRE'S CHILD
Anne led Alexis into the library, and fell into a chair before the fire.
"What does this mean? Have you left Claire after all?" Her widened eyes
stared at Alexis coldly. So all his good resolutions had meant just
nothing? The weakling strain would out. She might have guessed it.
But his gaze met hers unflinchingly. "Claire is dead," he whispered. The
words issued from pale lips almost inaudibly.
Hands pressed against the arms of her chair, Anne started up. Her rising
scream was subdued to a whisper. "Claire dead!"
He nodded dumbly. Throwing himself into a chair, he cupped his face in
trembling fingers. "Yes, Anne, Claire is dead. And I have killed her as
surely as if I'd stuck a knife into her, or put poison into her food."
Anne's hands flew instinctly to her mouth to check a cry.
"What do you mean?" Was it possible that----?
His misery-laden eyes encountered the question in hers without
comprehending its horrible significance.
"The child. My child," he replied with tragic simplicity.
"Ah!" Anne leaned her head against the chair-back. She closed her eyes
while a species of lucid swoon swept over her. So Claire was dead. They
had killed her between them. She and Alexis had killed a woman. For if
Alexis was guilty, so was she. Was she not the indirect cause of the
girl's misery? Might not Alexis have gone back to Claire if it had not
been for herself? That was problematical and open to doubt, so her
uncanny lucidity informed her. But the fact remained they had killed her
between them. And yet the very first time that Anne had seen Claire she
already bore within herself the seeds of death. Tragic germ of life,
that contains death! Poor, poor Claire!
"Poor Claire," she moaned beneath her breath almost unconsciously.
"And--the child?" she faltered, sturdily defiant of her fear.
"Lives."
"Thank God." Anne's face was suddenly wet with tears. "Tell me about
it." From a gulf of despair, Anne's voice smote upon his misery.
"It was horrible. Her face, her poor little dead face! I cannot sleep at
night for seeing it." He wrung tortured hands.
Anne shuddered. "Tell me about it," she whispered relentlessly.
He fixed his eyes upon her petrified face with a groan. "Oh, Anne, must
I tell you everything? Can't I spare you anything at all?"
"Tell me everything. I can bear it if you can." Her pupils narrowed in
an agony of pity, as they fell upon his white face.
He continued in a monotonous voice that muffled his suffering as a heavy
mist conceals the lip of a chasm. "I was in Chicago when I received the
telegram. I cancelled my engagements and rushed back to New York on the
next train. But it was too late--Claire was dead." Head heavy on his
chest, his lids drooped leadenly over a waxy face.
"Go on." Anne's voice was thick with tears.
"I went to the apartment. Dr. Elliott met me at the door. He was in his
shirt-sleeves." His voice choked and he was silent for a moment. "You
don't know Dr. Elliott, but he was Claire's friend as well as her
doctor. He--he loved Claire."
Anne showed her astonishment. Was it possible that between them they had
driven the child to such cheap consolation? He sensed her terror.
"No, Anne, Elliott was not Claire's lover. He merely loved her. He would
have liked to marry her if she had been willing to divorce me."
"I see. Poor man!" Anne's lips grew paler.
Alexis continued in the same emotionless tones.
"Yes, poor wretch. He is a fine fellow, and would have made her happy if
it hadn't been for me. So you understand, of course, how much he hates
me, don't you?"
"Of course, it is only natural." Her voice was warm with pity.
Alexis glanced up at her with pathetic gratitude. "He met me at the
door. He gave me one terrible look, a look that I shall never forget,
and said, 'Your wife is dead.' I--I don't know exactly what I did, but I
think I leaned against the wall and I must have looked odd, for he cried
out, 'Christ, this is no time to faint, man. Your wife is dead, I tell
you, and you've got to face it. It's your own neglect that has killed
her!' Those are the very words he used. They are branded into my brain."
He stopped short with a moan. Anne uttered a cry of pity.
"Poor boy, how you have suffered! But go on, I must know it all. That is
the only way I can help you."
Dark with pain and compassion, her eyes endowed him with renewed force.
"He told me horrors, Anne, but I deserved them all. He said there was no
reason why it should not have been a normal birth, except that Claire
had been so weakened by unhappiness that she simply didn't have the
physical stamina to pull her through. And he added that she didn't want
to live, that she felt all along that she wouldn't. That's why she
refused to go to the hospital. She couldn't bear the thought of dying
there. Anne, think of it. Think of poor Claire, knowing she was going to
die, and planning for it like that. Isn't it too pitiful?"
"Yes, it is horrible," Anne whispered, "and that is probably what killed
her. She was so sure she was going to die, that she made no effort to
help herself."
"That is what Elliott said. There wasn't much he didn't say. When he had
finished, he swept by me and out of the house and I haven't seen him
since, excepting----" he hesitated painfully, "at the funeral."
Anne winced. The funeral, how heartrending! She had never thought of
that, somehow. But of course there had had to be one. She avoided his
eyes that brimmed with knowledge of such horrors.
"I shall not speak of that." His voice fluted dangerously. "After
Elliott left I--I almost ran away myself. But the nurse came into the
hall and seemed to expect me to go in and see Claire. I didn't want to,
Anne. It was the most difficult thing I ever did in my life. I somehow
felt as if I hadn't the right to take advantage of her helplessness. But
the nurse couldn't know that, of course, so I followed her into the
room."
He paused and shaded his eyes with quivering fingers. "Anne, she was
beautiful. She looked rested as she used to when we were children
together. Her hair was braided in two plaits on either side of her face.
On one of her tiny hands gleamed the wedding ring. After that first
glimpse I couldn't take my eyes off it. It seemed so pathetic, somehow.
So tragic to have her wear it to the very end--and after. It wrenched at
my heart. I fell down by the bedside and cried. Afterwards," he
faltered.
Anne prompted him tenderly. "Afterwards?"
"Afterwards, when I was in the hall again, the nurse asked me if I
didn't want to see the child. I--I had forgotten all about it! Just to
think of it, Anne, I hadn't even remembered to ask if it had lived. My
own child! What kind of a brute do you think I am?"
"Merely a puzzled and a frightened one, poor Alexis. Certainly not the
monster you imagine. Come, tell me about the baby, dear."
Her compassion fell like oil upon his wounded soul. He loved her for it
and for the beautiful calm with which she suppressed her own sorrow,
which he sensed strongly beneath his own piercing misery.
"She left me for a moment and returned with a bundle in her arms. The
bundle whimpered a little like--like a sick kitten. I was afraid to
look, but the nurse thrust it under my eyes and I had to. It was a very
ugly baby, Anne. The little face was all screwed up. Pale and puny, not
fat and red like the babies in pictures. It made me a little sick at
first. I didn't want to touch it. It was sort of uncanny with its great,
hazy eyes staring out at me. However, she laid it in my arms and I had
to hold it, for fear it might fall on the ground and break if I didn't."
As he stopped for a moment, Anne smiled through tears. How very
masculine, even the most feminine of men can be under certain
conditions.
A new and softer expression spread over his tired face. The eyes
acquired an exalted expression. He continued. "Then an odd thing
happened, Anne, a very odd thing! As I held him away from me, he stirred
in my arms. I could feel his little feet kick my side, and a tiny fist,
like an unopened bud suddenly beat against my breast. A hand, knocking
at my heart, the hand of my son! It sent a thrill coursing all over me,
Anne. I bent over and kissed the pale, pathetic forehead. And as I met
the cloudy eyes, so full of sadness and mystery, I knew that I loved
him. And I vowed that I would make it all up to him, cherish him, bring
him up to be as different from myself as possible, that he might be both
happy and sane. Then, immediately, while he was still in my arms and I
could feel him stir against my heart, I thought of you, Anne. I thought
of you and knew that you would help us. You, who are so strong, so
beautifully sane yourself!"
Alexis rose and threw himself at Anne's feet. He seized her unresisting
hands and covered them with kisses.
"Oh, Anne, take pity on us! Love us if you can. We need you so
terribly!"
She caressed his head with compassionate hands. "Yes, dearest, yes." Her
eyes were tragic as she listened. "We need you so terribly." The words
of the Marchesa! She had used them eons ago, when this self-same
afternoon was young. Poor Marchesa! Poor Vittorio! They would suffer if
they were to lose her. But not like Alexis. Alexis and a baby!
Combination of helplessness! If she, Anne, were to forsake them, what
would become of them at all? And she owed it to Claire. It was the only
reparation she could make for the injuries she had been forced to
inflict upon her. To look after Alexis, to cherish him as the dead girl
had longed to do herself so that his marvelous art might not be stilled
by sorrow, to give her child, poor mite, the love and happiness its
mother had craved and never received. Anne's path seemed to lie clear
before her tear-washed eyes. Once more, Vittorio would have to be
sacrificed. This time forever. But he was strong. His grief would never
break him. He would make of it a staff to further progress. But
Alexis--for Alexis, her refusal might mean return to that dark Limbo
from which she had rescued him once before. And to that fate, so much
more bitter than death, Anne could never condemn him.
She pressed her cheek against the head that lay so humbly upon her
knees. She raised his face and looked down into the tragic young eyes. A
long look, a giving look, a look that poured divine essence of
compassion from her very soul, in a sort of spiritual transfusion, until
the face between her hands became suffused with rapture.
"No Alexis, do not be afraid, I shall not desert you now. Nothing but
your own will can ever separate us."
He looked up at her with the humility of a dumb beast. "Does this mean
you are really going to marry me, Anne?" he asked in hushed tones.
She nodded gravely. "If you wish it."
The rapture on his face brimmed over into tremulous laughter.
"Anne, Anne!" He was about to take her in his arms, but she repulsed him
with gentle dignity.
"No, Alexis, not now dear."
He understood. A subdued expression veiling his joy, he sat down quietly
at a little distance. Anne looked at him gratefully. After all, she
could always count upon his delicacy, which was a great comfort.
"Where is the child?" she inquired, making an effort to shoulder her new
responsibilities.
He looked pleased. "In the apartment in Gramercy Park. He has a trained
nurse, and is getting along very well. I had a cable yesterday. Oh,
Anne, will you try to love him?"
Anne smiled through the leaden lassitude that had suddenly fallen upon
her. "I shan't have to try. He is little and helpless and yours."
"Anne, my beautiful one, my angel!"
This time she did not evade the effusion, but resigned herself to the
hungry young arms.
Much later, after Alexis had gone, and the fire had smouldered into a
mound of white dust, Anne went to the telephone, and sent Vittorio the
wire which was to nullify so completely her summons of a few short hours
ago.