Before the bungalow, Jeannette jumped from the motor car and struggled to insert the twisted latch-key in the lock, but her fingers shook so much it took her some time to manage it. Behind her, Doc French and the strange man were lifting Martin from the car. As they wrenched him free he groaned painfully.
Jeannette flew into the house, flung on lights, tore back the gay-figured cretonne cover of the bed. Her underclothes lay upon the chair where she had tossed them when she had been so happily dressing. She gathered these with one swift reach and threw them to the floor of a closet. The stumbling feet were coming; the men were carrying Martin head and feet. With a concerted effort they heaved him upon the bed and he lay there inertly, sprawling, just as he had fallen.
“Can I help you, Mrs. Devlin?” asked the Doctor, dusting off his hands.
“Oh, no,—thank you very much,” Jeannette answered in a strained voice.
“Don’t you think we’d better undress him? He’s pretty heavy for you to manage alone.”
Jeannette looked at the helpless figure flung out across the bed, ungainly postured like a child’s discarded doll, purple lips parting with each breath, the hair damp and tousled. One of his garters had loosened and dangled now from the wrinkled hose that covered a patent-leather pump.
“No,” she said again slowly, “thank you very much for all your kindness, Doc,—but it’s my—my job; he belongs to me; I’ll take care of him.”
§ 8
Three hours later she walked out on the back porch. The heat of the Sunday morning was moist and tropical, giving promise of a scorching day. The bells of the Catholic Church on the “Point” road were ringing sweetly for the children’s mass. Her eyes felt burnt out from lack of sleep: two black holes in her head. Hilda was making a small fuss in the kitchen, rattling pans, droning hoarsely to herself. Jeannette stood at the porch railing and looked off across the quiet country, misty with the early heat. Emotions were at war in her heart, and there was pain—pain—pain.
She had not been to bed; she had not even lain down. The silver gown had been put away, her finery discarded, and now she wore the striped velveteen wrapper in which she usually did her morning’s work. She had undressed her husband, removed his shoes, drawn off his dress suit, tugging at its arms, rolling him from one side to another to free the clothing. She had washed his face with a cold wet rag and brushed the rumpled hair from his eyes. Then she had put the room in order, opened the casement windows, drawn the shades, closed the door and left him to peace and sleep. The house had needed straightening and to this she had turned her attention, adjusting rugs, pushing chairs into position, emptying ash receivers, carrying away newspapers, arranging magazines and books in neat piles, using broom and dust-pan, wiping the furniture with a dust cloth. Hilda had given her some coffee at eight o’clock and she had drunk it black and crunched some thin slices of buttered toast. Now nothing remained to be done and the thoughts to which she had resolutely shut her mind clamored for admittance to her weary brain. Remorse and reproach, censure and repugnance, disillusionment, humiliation, grief and regret,—they swarmed upon her like so many black flies.