LX
He did not stay long in Moscow. He took the train to Riga, and posted his articles across the Russian frontier. Then he went on to Berlin, with a “wire” in advance to Christy.
Christy met him at the station, and not only Christy, but Janet Welford.
“Sir Faithful!” she cried, using her old nickname for him. “By my halidom, but I’m glad to see you! After all this age of time.”
She took his hands, and gave him her cheek to kiss. Then a grave look came into her eyes, and the merriment died out.
“You’re not looking too well. Anything wrong with you, friend?”
“A bit chippy, that’s all,” said Bertram. “But enormously glad to see you again. Have you fixed it up with Christy?”
She blushed and laughed.
“We’ve made a kind of contract, subject to alteration.”
She took his arm, and spoke gravely again.
“You’re ill, my dear.”
“It’s nothing,” he said. “A chill!”
It was more than a chill. It was typhus. That night they put him to bed, fever-stricken. The vermin of the Volga had done their work. Janet Welford sat with him in a room that Christy had hired, and several times he spoke her name, without knowing she was near. Once he spoke another name which she had never heard before. “Nadia”—it sounded like that. But in his delirium he talked incessantly of Joyce. The image of the girl who had been his wife came back to him. They were married again. All else was blotted out.
“Joyce, darling! How beautiful you are! The ideal beauty! That was old Christy’s phrase. Joyce! . . . Joyce. . . . Is breakfast ready? What a kid you are! Why, Joyce, sweetheart, aren’t you ready yet? I’ve been waiting for you. I’m always lonely without you. Even for a second. Joyce . . . Joyce . . . Joyce. . . .”
Janet Welford bent over him.
He looked so young in his fever, with flushed cheeks and tousled hair. A boy again.
“Loyalty,” he said. “I’m nothing without loyalty, Joyce. It’s all yours.” He seemed to be arguing with her, trying to make her understand.
“The middle of the road. That’s where I am. Between the extremes, Joyce. A damned lonely place.”
A German doctor came with Christy.
“It is very dangerous,” he said. “This is Russian typhus. He must be removed to a hospital. In the morning. The authorities insist on it in cases of infectious fevers. To-night I will send you a nurse.”
“No,” said Janet Welford. “I’m nursing him to-night.”
“At the risk of your own life, gnädiges Fräulein.
“I’ll take the risk, doctor.”
Christy was anxious, helpless, gloomy.
“Turn and turn about,” he said. “I’ll take the night watch, my dear.”
“No,” she said again, “this is my work. Lie down till the morning, and be good.”
Early in the morning she came out of Bertram’s room.
“He keeps calling for Joyce. She ought to know. Can you send her a telegram?”
“Holme Ottery,” said Christy. “That ought to find her. But she doesn’t deserve it.”
“No woman deserves such love as his,” said Janet; and Christy saw that she had tears in her eyes. He knew that he was only second in her heart, and that Bertram held first place. She made no secret of it, and spoke frankly to him.
“I love every hair of his head, my dear. You won’t be angry when I tell you that?”
“Not angry,” said Christy, “nor jealous. I have your friendship, and it’s good enough.”
“My friendship for ever,” she said, “and more loyal because you know about this boy, and understand.”
“Need you send for Joyce?” he asked. “Perhaps if he gets well—”
She shook her head, and knew what he meant to say, and did not dare to say.
“No. That would be a dirty kind of trick, and I’ve kept clean, so far. All through the night he has kept calling for Joyce. She’s still in possession of him, and I’ve no claim.”
“In London,” said Christy, “he had to cut and run from you.”
He was arguing against his own hopes and chance.
“Yes,” said Janet, “I could have had him then. But it would have been stealing. Breaking his loyalty. I’m not like that.”
“He’s been too damned loyal,” said Christy. “My lady Joyce chucked him as she would a broken toy. Why send for her? Perhaps she won’t come, anyhow. The little bitch!”
“We’ll give her the chance,” said Janet, and she wrote out the telegram.
“We’ll play the game, for Bertram’s sake,” she said later. “It may be the last thing we can do for him. Another visitor may come before his wife gets here.”
“Is it as bad as that?” he asked.
“You know what typhus means. It burns quick. Oh, my dear, I think my love is dying!”
She wept a little, and Christy leaned over her and put his hand on her shoulder and said, “Courage!” She took hold of his hand and held it tight.
“Old Plesiosaurus! You’re a good friend in distress.”
“But not a lucky lover!” he answered gloomily.
“When we set up house together,” she said, “you’ll marvel at your luck!”
She laughed in her old gay way, even though her eyes were still wet with tears, and Christy was comforted by the promise of her words, and worshipful before this woman whose spirit was so honest and so kind. Her love for Bertram made no difference to him. Her comradeship was gift enough.
Together they went each day to the hospital where Bertram lay. The German doctors would not let them go into his ward, because of infection, and their reports were not comforting.
“Sehr krank! . . . Gross gefähr. . . . Es geht nicht wohl.”
Bertram was very ill. He was in great danger. It was not going well with him.
It was Janet who remembered that Bertram had a sister in Berlin—the beautiful Dorothy, now Frau von Arenburg. A note from her brought Dorothy and her husband to Christy’s room, infinitely distressed by the grave news. They haunted the hospital and Von Arenburg interviewed the doctors, and in his rather Prussian way impressed them with “the enormous importance” of Bertram’s recovery to the friendly relations between England and Germany.
Anna von Wegener sent immense bouquets of hot-house flowers which were never allowed to enter the sick man’s room, and other German ladies whom Bertram had met at his sister’s house were prodigal with fruit and flowers. But Bertram, lying there in delirium, knew none of this kindly remembrance from those whom he had called “the Enemy.”
“It is the crisis,” said the German doctors one day. “If he lives through the night—”
“Let’s pray a bit,” said Janet to her friend. “We’re both infidels, but God will understand.”
“I don’t believe in prayer,” said Christy. “I’m a blasphemer and a heretic.”
“So is all humanity,” said Janet. “But in time of trouble we cry out to God, in spite of disbelief.”
“It’s our cowardice,” said Christy. “It’s the dark of the mind. The primitive savage before the Ju-ju of his fears and hopes.”
“Children crying for help to the Eternal Father,” said Janet. “Something like that, though I can’t get the hang of it.”
They went together into a church somewhere off the Wilhelmstrasse, and kneeling side by side, Christy and Janet bent their heads and stayed in the silence and the gloom before an altar with twinkling lights, and in their queer way prayed to the Unknown God for Bertram, their friend.
“What was your prayer?” asked Janet, when they came out.
Christy smiled.
“Not much of a one. I said, ‘Oh, God, where in God’s name are you? Why have you made such a mess of this bloody old world?’ Then I kept on saying, ‘Oh, God! Oh, God!’ until my mind went into a kind of coma, very restful.”
“Fine,” said Janet. “A real confession of faith.”
“What was your prayer?” asked Christy.
Janet could hardly remember her prayer. She had offered her heart to the Unknown God, and said many times, “Dear God!” and then, “Dear Bertram!”
“We’re weakening,” said Christy. “This is nonsense. It’s a disgrace to the intellect.”
“No,” said Janet, “I’m strengthened. I believe God will like this little visit. I believe it’s a good thing to do.”
“Anyhow, it won’t do God or Bertram any harm,” said Christy.
He spoke in his sardonic way, but he, too, felt strangely comforted and puzzled at the meaning of it.
When they went back to the apartment house where Christy had rooms, they found Joyce there waiting for them. Neither of them had seen her before, and by a glance they tried to take the measure of this girl who was Bertram’s wife. She was very pale, and looked ill, but wonderfully young and elegant, and exquisite.
“How is my husband?” she asked, and that word “husband” seemed strange on her lips, because of her youthful girlish look.
Janet told her that he was pretty bad.
“It was good of you to wire to me,” Joyce said. “I am deeply grateful to you.”
“He called to you many times on the night he was first so ill,” said Janet.
A little mist came into Joyce’s eyes.
“I don’t deserve his remembrance. I’ve been rotten to him,” she said, humbly, and that humility and that confession softened their hearts towards her.
“He’s been very loyal to you,” said Janet. “ ‘Sir Faithful,’ his friends call him.”
“I was disloyal,” said Joyce. “Perhaps he told you?”
She looked at Janet Welford, and her face flamed with colour. Perhaps in some way she guessed that Janet had been Bertram’s best friend.
Janet nodded.
“Things happen like that. Perhaps they can’t be helped. It’s good if one gets a chance to patch things up. Life’s mostly patchwork.”
“When can I see him?”
She saw him that night. His fever had left him—“Our prayers!” said Janet—and the German doctors allowed Joyce to sit for a little while by his bedside. He was sleeping when she went into the ward where he lay alone, but presently he awoke and opened his eyes, and looked at her.
“Hullo, Joyce,” he said, in a kind of whisper. “I’m not dreaming again, am I?”
“I’ve come back,” she answered, and she put her arms about him and wept, so that her tears fell on his face.
He was silent for a little, while looking at her with a faint smile.
“Do you mean back for always?” he asked presently. “As man and wife?”
“If you’ll have me,” she said. “Do you forgive me, Bertram, for all my beastliness?”
He took her hand, and stroked the back of it with his finger-tips.
“How beautiful you are!” he said.
“Do you forgive me, dear heart?” she asked again.
“Hush,” he said. “There’s nothing to forgive. We were both kids.”
A little later he spoke again.
“I am sorry about Kenneth. Very rough on him and you.”
She bowed her head, and was very white.
“It was best like that. It has let me come back.”
“I knew a girl who died—in Russia—” said Bertram. “One day I’ll tell you. Not now. How’s England and Holme Ottery?”
“England’s still there. Holme Ottery’s sold. I’ve a little house close by. We’ll go back and live there. It’s ready for our home-coming.”
“Home-coming!” said Bertram. “How good that sounds! I’ve been wandering alone since you left me, Joyce. Always damned lonely.”
“I’m with you now,” said Joyce. “Body and soul, Bertram. The past is dead, and I’m changed.”
He put his arms about her, and drew down her head until it lay upon his breast.
“Let’s begin again,” he said. “We’re young enough.”
THE END