A Knight of the Nets

by Amelia E. Barr

After this kindness had been done, Sophy was dead to herself and the world for nearly three weeks. She remembered nothing, she knew nothing, she spoke only in the most disconnected and puzzling manner. For her speech wandered between the homely fisher life of her childhood and the splendid social life of Braelands. Her personality was equally perplexing. The clothing she wore was of the finest quality; her rings, and brooch, and jewelled watch, indicated wealth and station; yet her speech, especially during the fever, was that of the people, and as she began to help herself, she had little natural actions that showed the want of early polite breeding. No letter or card, no name or address of any kind, was found on her person; she appeared to be as absolutely lost as a stone dropped into the deep sea.

And when she came to herself and realised where she was, and found out from her attendant the circumstances under which she had been brought to the hospital, she was still more reticent. For her first thought related to the annoyance Archie would feel at her detention in a public hospital; her second, to the unmerciful use Madame would make of the circumstance. She could not reason very clearly, but her idea was to find her cousin and gain her protection, and then, from that more respectable covett, to write to her husband. She might admit her illness—indeed, she would be almost compelled to do that, for she had fallen away so much, and had had her hair cut short during the height of the fever—but Archie and Madame must not know that she had been in a public hospital. For fisher-people have a singular dislike to public charity of any kind; they help one another. And, to Sophy’s intelligence, the hospital episode was a disgrace that not even her insensibility could quite excuse.

Several weeks passed in that long, spotless, white room full of suffering, before Sophy was able to stand upon her feet, before indeed she began to realise the passage of time, and the consequences which must have followed her long absence and silence. But all her efforts at writing were failures. The thought she wished to express slipped off into darkness as soon as she tried to write it; her vision failed her, her hands failed her; she could only sink back upon her pillow and lie inert and almost indifferent for hours afterwards. And as the one letter she wished to write was to Archie, she could not depute it to any one else. Besides, the nurse would tell where she was, and that was a circumstance she must at all hazards keep to herself. It had been hot July weather when she was first placed on her hard, weary bed of suffering, it was the end of September when she was able to leave the hospital. Her purse with its few sovereigns in it was returned to her, and the doctor told her kindly, if she had any friends in the world, to go at once to their care.

“You have talked a great deal of the sea and the boats,” he said; “get close to the sea if you can; it is perhaps the best and the only thing for you.”

She thanked him and answered: “I am going to the Fife coast. I have friends there, I think.” She put out a little wasted hand, and he clasped it with a sigh.

“So young, so pretty, so good,” he said to the nurse, as they stood watching her walk very feebly and unsteadily away.

“I will give her three months at the longest, if she has love and care. I will give her three weeks—nay, I will say three days, if she has to care for herself, or if any particular trouble come to her.”

Then they turned from the window, and Sophy hired a cab and went to Monteith Row to try and find her friends. She wanted to write to her husband and ask him to come for her. She thought she could do this best from her cousin’s home. “I will give her a bonnie ring or two, and I will tell her the whole truth, and she will be sure to stand by me, for there is nothing wrong to stand by, and blood is aye thicker than water.” And then her thoughts wandered on to a contingency that brought a flush of pain to her cheeks. “Besides, maybe Archie might have an ill thought put into his head, and then the doctors and nurses in the hospital could tell him what would make all clear.” She went through many of the houses, inquiring for Ellen Montgomery, but could not find her, and she was finally obliged to go to a hotel and rest. “I will take the lave of the houses in the morning,” she thought, “it is aye the last thing that is the right thing; everybody finds that out.”

That evening, however, something happened which changed all her ideas and intentions. She went into the hotel parlour and sat down; there were some newspapers on the table, and she lifted one. It was an Edinburgh paper, but the first words her eyes fell on was her husband’s name. Her heart leaped up at the sight of it, and she read the paragraph. Then the paper dropped from her hands. She felt that she was going to faint, and by a supreme effort of will she recalled her senses and compelled them to stay and suffer with her. Again, and then again, she read the paragraph, unable at first to believe what she did read, for it was a notice, signed by her husband, advising the world in general that she had voluntarily left his home, and that he would no longer be responsible for any debt she might contract in his name. To her childlike, ignorant nature, this public exposure of her was a final act. She felt that it was all the same as a decree of divorce. “Archie had cast her off; Madame had at last parted them.” For an hour she sat still in a very stupour of despair.

“But something might yet be done; yes, something must be done. She would go instantly to Fife; she would tell Archie everything. He could not blame her for being sick and beyond reason or knowledge. The doctors and nurses of the hospital would certify to the truth of all she said.” Ah! she had only to look in a mirror to know that her own wasted face and form would have been testimony enough.