CHAPTER IV.
She changed colour—from fair to flush, from red to white again—and her hand upon the gold cord trembled. I remembered it afterward, though I was not conscious of noticing it at the time.
"You need not," she replied, in her low, controlled voice, "on my account. You need never come again."
"It is easier to come," I answered irritably, "than to know that you sit here making yourself miserable because I don't."
"Have I ever fretted you about coming, Esmerald? I did not know it."
"It would be easier if you did fret!" I cried crossly. "I'd rather you'd say a thing than look it. Any man would."
Indeed, it would have been a paltry satisfaction to me just then if I could have found her to blame. Her blamelessness irritated my self-complacence as the light irritates defective eyes.
"I am due at the hospital in twenty-two minutes," I went on, excitedly. "Chirugeon is behaving like Apollyon. If I'm not there to handle him, nobody will. The whole staff are afraid of him—everybody but me. We sha'n't get the new ward built these two years if he carries the day to-night. I've got a consultation at Decker's—the old lady is dying. It's no sort of use dragging a tired man out there; I can't do her any good; but they will have it. I'm at the beck and call of every whim. Isn't that dinner ready? I wish I had time to change my boots! They are wet through. My head aches horribly. Brake telegraphed me to get down to Stock Street before two o'clock to save what is left of that Santa Ma stock. I couldn't go. I had an enormous office—forty people. I've lost ten thousand dollars in this panic. I've got to see Brake on my way to Decker's. I lost a patient this morning—that little girl of the Harrowhart's. She was a poor little scrofulous thing. But they are terribly cut up about it.... Chowder? I wish you'd had a good clear soup. I don't feel as if I could touch chowder. I hope you have some roast beef, better than the last. You mustn't let Parsnip cheat you. Quail? There's no nourishment in a quail for a man in my state. The gas leaks. Can't you have it attended to? Hurry up the coffee. I must swallow it and go. I've got more than ten men could do."
"It is more than one woman can do"—she began gently, when I came to the end of this outbreak and my breath together.
"What did you say? Do speak louder!"
"I said it seems to be more than one woman can do, to rest you."
"Yes," I said carelessly, "it is. You can't do the first thing for me, except to do me the goodness to ring for a decent cup of coffee. I can't drink this."
"Esmerald"—
"Oh, what? I can't stop to talk. There, I've burned my tongue, now. If there's anything I can't stand, it is going to a consultation with a burned tongue."
"How tired you are, Esmerald! I was only going to say that I am sorry. I can't let you go without saying that."
"I can't see that it helps it any. I am so tired I don't want to be touched. Never mind my coat. I'll put it on myself. Tell Joe—no. I left the horse standing. I don't want Joe. I suppose Donna is uneasy by this time. She won't stand at night—she's got to. I'll get that whim out of her. Now, don't look that way. The horse is safe enough. Don't you suppose I know how to drive? You're always having opinions of your own against mine. There. I must be off."
"Where's the baby, Helen?" I turned, with my hand upon the latch of my heavy oaken door, and jerked the question out, as cross men do.
"The baby isn't just right, somehow, Esmerald. I bated to bother you, for you never think it is anything. I dare say he will be better, but I thought I wouldn't let him come out of the nursery. Jane is with him. I've been a little troubled about him. He has cried all the afternoon."
"He cries because you coddle him!" I exploded. "It is all nonsense, Helen. Nothing ails the child. I won't encourage this sort of thing. I'll see him when I come home. I can't possibly wait—I am driven to death—for every little whim"—
But at the door I stopped. If the baby had been a patient he would have seen no doctor that night. But the father in me got the better of me, and without a word further to my wife I ran up to the nursery.
She stayed below; she perceived (Helen was always quick), although I had not said so, that I did not wish her to follow me. I examined the child hastily. The little fellow stopped crying at the sight of me, and put up both arms to be taken. I said:—
"No, Boy. Papa can't stop now," and put him gently back into his crib. When I had reached the nursery door I remember that I returned and kissed him. I was very angry, but I could not be angry with my baby. With the touch of his little lips, dewy and sweet, upon mine, I rushed down to my wife, and tempestuously began again:—
"Helen, I must have an end to this nonsense. Nothing ails the baby; he is only a trifle feverish with a new tooth. It really is very unpleasant to me that you make such a fuss over him. If you had married a greengrocer it might have been pardonable. Pray remember that you have married a physician who understands his business, and do leave me to manage it. Take the child out of the nursery. Carry him downstairs as usual for a few minutes. He will sleep better. There! I'm eight minutes behindhand already, all for this senseless anxiety of yours. It is a pity you can't trust me, like other men's wives! I wish I'd married a woman with a little wifely spirit!—or else not married at all."
I shut the door; I am afraid I slammed it. I cleared the steps at a bound, and ran fiercely out into the night air. The wind was rising, and the weather was growing sharp. It was frosty and noisy. Donna, my chestnut mare, stood pawing the pavement in high temper, and called to me as she heard my step. She had dragged at her weight a little; she was thoroughly displeased with the delay. It occurred to me that she felt as I had acted. It even occurred to me to go back and tell my wife that I was ashamed of myself.
I turned and looked in through the parlour windows. The shades were up, and the gas was low. Dimly beyond, the bright panel of the lighted library arose between the crimson curtains. She stood against it, midway between the two rooms. Her hands had dropped closed one into the other before her. Her face was toward the street. She seemed to be gazing at me, whom she could not see. Her white dress, which hung in thick folds, the pallor of her face and her delicate hands, gave her the look of a statue; its purity, and to my fancy at that moment its permanence. She seemed to be carved there, like something that must stay.
I turned to go back—yes, I would have gone. It is little enough for a man to say for himself under circumstances like these; but perhaps I may be allowed to say it, since to exculpate myself is the last of my motives. I had made a stop or two up the flagging between the deep grass-plots that fronted the house, when the mare, disturbed beyond endurance at a movement of delay which she too well understood, gave a shrill whinny, and reared, pulling and dragging at her weight fiercely. She was a powerful creature, and the weight yielded, hitting at her heels. In an instant she had cramped the wheels, and I saw that the buggy would go over. To spring back, reach the bit, snatch the reins, leap over the wheel, and whirl away in the reeling carriage was the work of some thing less than a thought; it was the elemental instinct by which a man must manage his horse, come life or death.
Like most doctors, I was something of a horseman, and the idea of being thwarted by any of Donna's whims had never occurred to me. I knew that the horse was pulling hard, but beyond that, I could not be said to have knowledge, much less fear; the mad conflict between the brute and the man possessed me to the exclusion of intelligence.
It was some moments before it struck me that my own horse was running away with me.
My first, perhaps I may say my only emotion at the discovery was one of overpowering rage.
I did not mean to strike her. No driver, ever if an angry one, would have done that. But I had the whip in my hand, around which the reins were knotted for the struggle, and when the horse broke into a gallop the jerk gave her a flick. I was not in the habit of whipping her. She felt herself insulted. It was now her turn to be angry; and an angry runaway means a bad business. Donna put down her head, struck out viciously from behind, and kicked the dasher flat. From that moment I lost all control of her.
I thought:—
"She is headed down town. At this rate, in five minutes she will be in the thick of travel. I have so many minutes more."
For how long I cannot tell, I had beyond this no other intelligent idea. Then I thought;—
"I should not like to be the man who has got to tell Helen." This repeated itself dully: "I should not care to be the fellow who will be sent to tell Helen."
I had ceased to call to the mare; it only made matters worse; but there was great hubbub in the streets as we leaped on. There were several attempts to head her off, I think. One man caught at her bridle. This frightened her; she threw him off, and threw him down. I think she must have hurt him. We were now well down town. Window lights and carriage lights flared by deliriously. The wind, which was high, at speed like that seemed something demoniac. I remember how much it added to my sense of danger. I remember that my favourite phrase occurred to me:—
"I am driven to death."
Suddenly I saw approaching an open landau. The street was full of vehicles, some of which I was sure to run down; but none of them seemed to give me concern except this one carriage. It contained a lady and a little boy, patients of mine. I recognized them forty feet away. He was a pretty little fellow, and she was fond of me; sent for me for everything; trusted me beyond reason; could not live without her doctor—that kind of patient. She had been a great sufferer. It seemed infernal to me that it should be they.
I shouted to her coachman:—
"Henry! For God's sake—to the left! To the left!"
But Henry stared at me like one struck dead. I thought I heard him say;—
"Marm, it's the doctor!" and after that I heard no more.
As the crash came, I saw the woman's face. She had recognized me with her look of sweet trustfulness; it froze to mortal horror. She clasped the child. I saw his cap come off from his yellow curls, and one little hand tossed out as the landau went over. The mare, now mad as any maniac, ran on.
Something had broken, but it mattered little what. I think we turned a corner. I think she struck a lamp-post or a tree. At all events, the buggy went over; and, scooped into the top, and dragged, and blinded, and stunned, I came to the ground.
As I went down, I uttered the two words of all that are human, most solemn; perhaps, one may add, most automatic. Believer or sceptic, saint or sinner, mortal danger hurls them from us, as it wrests the soul from out our bodies.
I said, "My God!" precisely as I threw out my arms, to catch at whatever could hold me when I could no longer hold myself.