So he gathered Evered into his arms, gathered him up so tenderly, and held the man against his breast, and Ruth supported Evered’s drooping head as she walked beside John. They came to the gate and it was too narrow for them to pass through. So Ruth went through alone, to open the wider gate from the outside.
She found Darrin there, standing uncertainly. She looked at him as she might have looked at a stranger. She was hardly conscious that he was there at all. When he saw what she meant to do he would have helped her. She turned to him then, and she seemed to bring her thoughts back from a great distance; she looked at him for a moment and then she said, “Go away!”
He cried, “Ruth! Please——”
She repeated, “I want you to go away. Oh,” she cried, “go away! Don’t ever come here again!”
Darrin moved back a step, and she swung the gate open so that John could come through, and closed it behind him, and walked with him to the kitchen door, supporting Evered’s head. Darrin hesitated, then followed them uncertainly.
When they came to the door Ruth opened it, and John—moving sidewise so that his burden should not brush against the door frame—went into the kitchen, and across. Ruth passed round him to open the door into Evered’s own room; and John went through.
When he reached the bedside and turned to lay Evered there he missed Ruth. He looked toward the kitchen; and he saw her standing in the outer doorway. Darrin was on the steps before her. John heard Darrin say something pleadingly. Ruth stood still for a moment. Then John saw her slowly shut the door, shutting out the other man. And he saw her turn the key and shoot the bolt.
She came toward him, running; and her eyes were full of tears.
They laid Evered on his own bed, the bed he and Mary Evered had shared. Ruth put the pillow under his head; and because it was cold in the room she would have drawn a blanket across him. John shook his head. He was loosening the other’s garments, making swift examination of his father’s hurts, pressing and probing firmly here and there.
Evered had drifted out of consciousness on the way to the house; but his eyes opened now and there was sweat on his forehead. He looked up at them steadily and soberly enough.