increase; they were as if besieged by demons of cold and storm. There
came another blizzard, and the snows drifted down to their hollow by the
edge of the woods, so that it was two days before they could get out,
even to the farm-house. And there was no place for them to walk--a path
from their house to Thyrsis’ study was a labor of half a day to dig.
Also Corydon caught a cold, which ran in due course through the little
family, and added to their misery and discomfort.
The snow seemed to be symbolical, walling them in from all the world.
“There is no help”, it seemed to say to them; whatever strength they got
they must wring out of their own hearts. Here in this place, it
seemed to Thyrsis, he learned the real meaning of Winter; he saw it as
primitive man had seen it, a cruel and merciless assailant, a fiend that
came ravening, dealing destruction and death. He thought of the ode by
Thomas Campbell--
“Archangel! Power of desolation!
Fast descending as thou art,
Say, hath mortal invocation
Spells to touch thy stony heart?”
Surely no Runic Odin, who “howled his war-song to the gale”, no Lapland
savage who cowered in his hut, ever panted for the respite of the
spring-time more than these two lovers in their tiny cottage.
It was evident that Corydon was going down-hill under the strain. She
became more and more nervous and wretched, her headaches and her fits
of exhaustion were more frequent. Then, too, her old mental trouble, the
habit of “thinking things”, was plaguing her again--She would come to
Thyrsis with long accounts of her psychological entanglements, and he
would patiently unravel the skein. Or sometimes, if he was very tired,
he might give some signs of a desire to escape the ordeal; and then he
would see a look of terror stealing into Corydon’s eyes. So these things
were real after all--they were real even to Thyrsis!
One morning he opened his eyes, and looked from his study-window, to
find that another heavy snow had fallen; and when he had dressed and
gone over to the house, he found Corydon in bed. She complained of
a headache, and had had chills during the night, and was now quite
evidently feverish. He was alarmed, and after he had made her as
comfortable as he could, he dressed the baby and took him upon his
shoulder, and made his way with difficulty to the farm-house. He left
the baby there, and with a horse and sleigh set out for town. The horse
had to walk all the way, and several times the sleigh was upset in the
drifts, so that it was two hours before he reached his destination. As
the doctor was out upon his rounds, he had to wait a couple of hours
more--and then only to learn that the man could not possibly attempt the
trip. He had several patients who were dangerously ill, and he had to be
on hand.
He sent Thyrsis to another doctor, but this one said exactly the same;
and so the boy spent the day wandering about the town. The thought of
Corydon’s lying there alone, helpless and suffering, made him wild;
but everywhere he met with the same response--the cold weather had
apparently brought an epidemic of disease, and there was no doctor in
the place who could spare three or four hours to make the long journey
in the snow.
So there was nothing for him to do but go back. The farmer’s wife
offered to take care of the baby over night, and he went down to the
cottage alone where he found Corydon much worse. He sat and held her
hand, a terror clutching at his heart; and all night long he sat and
tended her--he filled hot water bottles when she was chilled, and got
ice when she was hot, and made cool lemonade, and prepared tidbits and
tempted her to eat. He would whisper to her and soothe her; and later,
when she fell into a doze, he sat nodding in his chair and shivering
with cold, but afraid to touch the fire for fear of disturbing her.
Then, towards dawn, she wakened; and Thyrsis was almost beside himself
with anguish and fear--for she was delirious, and did not know where she
was, or what she was doing. She kept talking as if to the baby--in their
baby-talk. Thyrsis would listen, until he would choke up with tears.
He left her, and went up to the farm, and got the horse and sleigh
again, and drove to another town. It made no difference what doctor
he got--to Thyrsis all doctors were alike, the keepers of the keys of
health. After several hours’ pursuit he found that this man also was
busy. All he could say was that he would try to get out that night.
So Thyrsis went back again, to find his wife with flushed face, and
beads of perspiration upon her forehead; now sitting up and babbling
aimlessly, now sinking back exhausted. He sat once more through a night
of torment, holding her hot hands in his, and praying in vain for the
coming of the doctor.
It was afternoon of the next day before the man finally came, and
brought some relief to Thyrsis’ soul, and perhaps also to Corydon’s
body. He took her temperature and listened to her breathing, and
pronounced it a severe attack of grippe, with a touch of bronchitis; and
he laid out an assortment of capsules and liquids, and promised to come
again if Thyrsis sent for him.
And so the boy set out in the double role of trained nurse and mother’s
assistant. He gave Corydon her medicines, and brought fresh water for
her, and smoothed her pillows and talked to her, and prepared some
delicacies for her when she wished to eat; also he dressed and bathed
the baby, and cooked his complex meals and fed them to him; he put
on his rubbers and his leggings and his mittens, and the overcoat and
peaked hood (which Corydon had devised for him out of eighty cents’
worth of woolly red cloth), and turned him out to “bongie cowtoos”
in the snow. Likewise he got his own meals and washed the dishes, and
tended the fires and emptied the ashes and filled the lamps and swept
the floors; and in the interim between these various duties he fought
new battles within himself, and got new side-lights upon Chickamauga and
“Bloody Angle”.