THIRTY-SECOND CHAPTER
IN THE LITTLE ROOM NEXT
They sailed around open water until daybreak, when Bedient brought the Savonarola into a river-mouth on Carreras land, and forcing her in out of the current, dropped anchor. The small boat was launched and pulled ashore. Six, a silent and weary six, they were. The hacienda was five miles inland. Bedient sent natives there for saddle-ponies, and made the party comfortable until these were brought. The roads would not permit vehicle of any sort, and though saddling was an ordeal for the Glow-worm and Madame Sorenson, the distance was not great, and from every eminence there were flashes of morning glory upon the endless company of hills.
Falk and Leadley stood upon the great porch as the cavalcade drew up. They steadied and leaned upon each other in this climacteric moment of their service…. There was breakfast with Carreras coffee, and the party separated for rest. The still torrid day became more vivid, and the native women and children hushed one another under the large open windows…. Miss Mallory was last in the breakfast room. Bedient saw that she wanted to speak with him, and they walked out on the porch together.
"You say it will be six days before the Henlopen leaves for New
York?" she asked.
"Yes, and no Pleiad for you, Miss Mallory. There will be changes and disorder down in the city…. I'll make you comfortable as I can."
"Oh, I'll like that! It's so still and restful—and—from here—last night seems ages behind…. It would have been unbearable, but for what you said about the other men's lives saved. Then the Glow-worm had told me so much! He was unspeakable…. As for Sorenson, I just couldn't have done that had I thought of sharks first!… I wonder what Rey meant to do—just before … yes, yes, let's forget him!… When you are rested, there is something I have to tell you."
"And there is something for me to say—but now?" he questioned.
"I want you to let me take care of you—during the six days——"
The old feminine magnetism thrilled him again. It was so strange and unexpected from Miss Mallory—a breath from the old Dream Ranges. It quickened him to the race of women, even to the great work, as he had not been quickened since the night he looked back at the empty open door…. He did not speak, but held out both hands to her.
"I think you are living and moving at this moment," she went on fervently, "upon some strange force that other people do not have. Since we left New York, I have watched you—seen you almost every day. You are like a traveler who has crossed some terrible and forbidden land. You do not eat nor sleep. I must help you. Please let me…. Oh, it isn't as if I were a girl! I've worked with men—done a man's work among the newspapers. I'd call it bigger than all that has happened for the good fortune of Equatoria—if I could make you look as——"
She checked the tumult of words. There was a misty look in her eyes—and his. He smiled and held himself hard, to say steadily:
"A man doesn't often win so dear a friend——"
"You have found about me so much of humor and scheming," she said pathetically, "but since I came to understand a little, I've wanted to show you other things——"
"I could not have relished your humor, nor used your plans, had I not felt so much besides." He pointed over the shining lands. "Great good can come from all this—perhaps you'll help me—where the suffering is blackest in New York. With that big tramp steamer in The Pleiad, and Celestino in command, it would have been hard to save this. You did it——"
"If I did, it's not vital to you. It does not bring you rest. How clearly I see that!"
Bedient turned aside from her tearful searching eyes. He was facing the old battle; and yet a certain uplift came from her brave spirit. It was one of the big intimate warmths of the world, one of the fine moments of life in the world. Her giving was true. He could think of no other who could have helped him in this way, save Vina Nettleton. These two had not entered his mind together before. And they were unlike in every way, except in their pure quality of giving.
"Please tell me that other matter now—why you were so good to me, even on the steamer?"
"But I want you to rest."
"I would rest better——"
Miss Mallory looked up at him for a moment, and embarrassment came to her face—different from any look of hers before.
"It was in New York…. I wore a white net waist and a big bunch of English violets," she said, watching him. "It seems very long ago, but it isn't—hardly ten weeks. There was darkness and Hedda was telling young Lövborg to drink wine and get vine-leaves in his hair——"
"And you were the one?" Bedient said.
"'So fleet the works of men, back to their earth again,
Ancient and holy things fade like a dream,'"
she repeated.
"I remember."
"And do you remember the first scream?… If I were a lost and freezing traveler in Siberia, the first cry of a gathering wolf-pack could not have more terror for me than that scream. And, I can hear the snapping of the chair-backs still, hideous secrets from human lips, and the scraping, panting, packing. I was hurt in the first crazy rush. I crushed the violets to my lips to keep out the smoke and gas…. Then your voice, 'Now's the time for vine-leaves, fellows,—there's a woman for everyone to help!' I heard you laugh and challenge the men to their best manhood…. And all the time, I thought I was dying…. Then your foot touched me, and I heard you say, 'Why, here's a little one left for me——'"
"Your hair had come undone," he said softly.
"And you never looked under the violets——"
"I went back to look for you. I wasn't gone a minute, but you had vanished."
"They took me away in the car—then I thought of the story and I didn't see you again, until you brushed by me in the Dryden ticket office in New York—the day before we sailed——"
"And you've been my good angel ever since——"
"I want to be—now…. Please get me a glass of warm milk."
He obeyed. From her bag she produced a powder and, at her word, Bedient held forth his tongue….
"And now I want you to drink the milk—all of it. You put down asterisks in the place of breakfast—quite as usual. I considered my self-control remarkable at the time."
He drank the milk slowly, as she had ordered…. The moments were sensational. Picture after picture passed through the light of his mind, as from other lives, and the loves of many women; and then the whole story that he had told Beth Truba rushed by—the mother's hand and the little boy—the city, the parks, the ships—the hours upon her arm, when she had made him over anew to face the long voyage alone—the questions he had asked—the last port with her, which he had never been able to find—the last ride with Beth—until he was shaken with the rush of visions. Everything that he was, and hoped to be, everything that he had thought of beauty and truth and giving, every aspiration and every inspiration—seemed gifts of women! His very life and all that had come to him—gifts of women. And all their loving, wistful, smiling faces were there—among the Dream Ranges…. Now this one was speaking:
… "I want you to show me where I am to rest and where you are to
rest."
Up they went together and softly…. He led her into his own room, but she saw his things and would not.
"This is where you belong," she whispered. "You will rest better here…. Please don't dispute…. But let me be near, if you will."
He showed her a little room that joined his own. Falk had made it ready.
"Just the place for me…. And after you have lain down, please whistle softly. I shall come in and read to you until you are asleep."
"It's like a fairy story already," he said.
* * * * *
He closed his eyes, and the pictures took up their swift passing again. It was not the drug, but the new thing in this life of his—a woman's ministering…. She came in presently, her hair loosened. She wore one of his silk night-coats, the sleeves rolled up; and very little, she looked, in the heelless straw sandals. She was pale. He saw the throbbing artery in her white throat. The polished ebon floor had a startling effect upon her black hair.
"You are like Rossetti's Pomegranate picture," he said, and added with a strange smile, "Do you know there is something true about you—arrow-true?"
She sat down in the chair near him and picked up the Book. "What shall I read?" she asked without looking up. "It must be something that will soothe, and not make you think, except happily."
"It's all there…. The stately prose of Isaiah—I love the ringing authority of it——"
She read. There were delicate shadings of volume, even in her lowered voice, which lent a fine natural quality to her expression. Bedient knew the words, but he loved the mystery of this giving of hers—her giving of peace to him…. He had obeyed her implicitly, and the morning had become very dear…. Ill and weary, all his nerves smarting with terrific fatigue, as the eyes smart before tears, and yet her ministering had made him a little boy again…. His eyelids were shut and he was happy. It was a bewildering sense, so long had he been, and so far, from a moment like this. His immortal heroine was close once more—she of the answered questions and the healing arms. So real was it, that he thought this must be death…. A sign from her made him know that it was not…. Queer, bright thoughts winged in and out of his mind. There was a drowsy sweep to the atmosphere—no, it was the nuances of the voice that read to him…. "When one comes to see in this life a clearer, brighter way for the conduct of the next, he has not failed." His mind went over this several times…. And presently he felt himself sailing through space toward one bright star. For eternities he had sailed—dominant, deathless—often wavering in the zones of attraction of other worlds, but never really losing that primal impetus for his own light of the universe…. And so while she read, Bedient drifted afar, sailing on and on toward his star….
She saw that he slept, and her head dropped forward until it touched the edge of his bed, but very softly…. And there, for a long time, she remained, until the woven cane left a white impress upon her forehead.
Late in the afternoon the others met below, but Bedient had not awakened. Miss Mallory joined them and told what she had done, and how ill he had been for need of rest…. When the day was ending she stole through the little room into his. Still he slept, so softly, that she bent close to hear his breathing…. All the furious moments of action in recent days passed in swift review, as she stood there in the dark. And from it all came this:
"It is a good thing for a woman to serve a man, with hand and brain,—as one man might serve another—and there's high joy in it; but a woman must not serve a man that way—if she'd rather have his love than hope of heaven."
… And when he awakened, she was still beside him.