THE SICK AND THE DEAD.
The bit of road that lay between Madame Le Maître's house and the house
allotted to Caius led, winding down a hill, through a stunted fir-wood.
The small firs held out gnarled and knotty branches towards the road;
their needles were a dark rich green.
Down this road Caius saw the lady come riding. Her horse was a beautiful
beast, hardly more than a colt, of light make and chestnut colour. She
herself was not becomingly attired; she wore just the same loose black
dress that she had worn in the house, and over the white cap a black
hood and cloak were muffled. No doubt in ancient times, before carriages
were in use, ladies rode in such feminine wrappings; but the taste of
Caius had been formed upon other models. He mounted his own horse and
joined her on the road without remark. He had found no saddle, only a
blanket with girths, and upon this he supposed he looked quite as
awkward as she did. The lady led, and they rode on across the island.
Caius knew that now it was the right time to tell Madame Le Maître what
had occurred the night before, and the ill-usage he had suffered. As she
appeared to be the most important person on the island, it was right
that she should know of the mysterious band of bandits upon the
beach--if, indeed, she did not already know; perhaps it was by power of
these she reigned. He found himself able to conjecture almost anything.
When he had quickened his horse and come beside her for the purpose of
relating his adventure, she began to speak to him at once. She told him
what number of cases of illness were then on her list--six in all. She
told him the number who had already died; and then they came past the
cemetery upon the hillside, and she pointed out the new-made graves. It
appeared that, although at that time there was an abatement in the
number of cases, diphtheria had already made sad ravages among the
little population; and as the winter would cause the people to shut up
their houses more and more closely, it was certain to increase rather
than to diminish. Then Madame Le Maître told him of one case, and of
another, in which the family bereavement seemed particularly sad. The
stories she told had great detail, but they were not tedious. Caius
listened, and forgot that her voice was musical or that her hood and
cloak were ugly; he only thought of the actors in the short sad idylls
of the island that she put before him.
When they entered the first house, he discovered that she herself had
been in the habit of visiting each of the sick every day as nurse, and,
as far as her simple skill could go, as doctor too. In this house it was
a little child that lay ill, and as soon as Caius saw it he ceased to
hope for its recovery. They used the new remedies that he had brought
with him, and when he looked round for someone who could continue to
apply them, he found that the mother was already dead, and the father
took no charge of the child--he was not there. A half-grown boy of about
fifteen was its only nurse, and he was not deft or wise, although love,
or a rude sense of conscience, had kept him from deserting his post.
"When we have visited the others, I will come back and remain," said
Madame Le Maître.
So they rode on down the hill and along the shingled beach that edged a
lagoon. Here the sea lapped softly and they were sheltered from the
wind. Here, too, they saw the other islands lying in the crescent they
composed, and they saw the waves of the bay break on the sand-bank that
was the other arm of the lagoon. Still Caius did not tell about his
adventure of the night before. The lady looked preoccupied, as if she
was thinking about the Angel of Death that was hovering over the cottage
they had left.
The next house was a large one, and here two children were ill. They
were well cared for, for two of the young girls whom he had seen in
Madame Le Maître's house were there for the time to nurse them.
They took one of these damsels with them when they went on. She was
willing to walk, but Caius set her upon his horse and led it; in this
way they made quicker progress. Up a hill they went, and over fields,
and in a small house upon a windy slope they found the mother of a
family lying very ill. Here, after Caius had said all that there was to
say, and Madame Le Maître, with skilful hands, had done all that she
could do in a short time, they left the young girl.
At the next and last house of their round, where the day before one
child had been ill, they now found three tossing and crying with pain
and fever. When it was time for them to go, Caius saw his companion
silently wring her hands at the thought of leaving them, for the mother,
worn out and very ignorant, was the only nurse. It did not seem that it
could be helped. Caius went out to his horse, and Madame Le Maître to
hers, but he saw her stand beside it as if too absent in mind to spring
to its back; her face was looking up into the blue above.
"You are greatly troubled," said Caius.
"Oh yes," her voice was low, but it came like the sound of a cry. "I do
not know what to do. All these months I have begged and entreated the
people to keep away from those houses where there was illness. It was
their only hope. And now that they begin to understand that, I cannot
bring the healthy to nurse the sick, even if they were willing to come.
They will take no precautions as we do. It is not safe; I have tried
it."
She did not look at Caius, she was looking at the blue that hung over
the sea which lay beneath them, but the weariness of a long long effort
was in her tone.
"Could we not manage to bring them all to one house that would serve as
a hospital?"
"Now that you have come, perhaps we can," she said, "but at present----"
She looked helplessly at the door of the house they had left.
"At present I will nurse these children," Caius said. "I do not need to
see the others again until evening."
He tied his horse in a shed, and nursed the children until the moon was
bright. Then, when he had left them as well as might be for the night,
he set out to return on his former track by memory. The island was very
peaceful; on field or hill or shore he met no one, except here and there
a plodding fisherman, who gave him "Good-evening" without apparently
knowing or caring who he was. The horse they knew, no doubt, that was
enough.
He made the same round as before, beginning at the other end. At the
house where the woman was ill the girl who was nursing her remained. At
the next house the young girl, who was dressed for the road, ingenuously
claimed his protection for her homeward way.
"I will go with you, monsieur, it will be more safe for me."
So he put her on his horse, but they did not talk to one another.
At the third house they found Madame Le Maître weeping passionately over
a dead baby, and the lout of a boy weeping with her. It surprised Caius
to feel suddenly that he could almost have wept, too, and yet he
believed that the child was better dead.
Someone had been out into the winter fields and gathered the small white
everlasting flowers that were still waving there, and twined them in the
curls of the baby's hair, and strewed them upon the meagre gray sheet
that covered it.
When they rode down to the village they were all quite silent. Caius
felt as if he had lived a long time upon this island. His brain was full
of plans for a hospital and for disinfecting the furniture of the
houses.
He visited the good man in whose barn he had slept the preceding night.
He went to his little house and fed himself and his horse. He discovered
his portmanteaus that O'Shea had promised to deliver, and found that
their contents had not been tampered with; but even this did not bring
his mind back with great interest to the events of the former night. He
was thinking of other things, and yet he hardly knew of what he was
thinking.