Eventually there came the terrible day when Mrs. Sturgis and Alice went forth to the dental surgeon, and when the young girl brought her spent and broken mother home in a cab. The four flights of stairs for the exhausted woman were a dreadful ordeal. Jeannette, catching a glimpse of the labored progress, as she gazed over the balustrade from the top landing, forgot her own weakened condition, the doctor’s caution, and hurried to her mother’s assistance. She ran down the stairs and grasped the little woman’s almost fainting figure in her young arms. Together the sisters dragged and pushed her up the remaining steps, but the older girl knew before she reached the top, that she had put too great a strain upon her own partially regained strength.
She paid for the imprudence by another three weeks in bed. It was the longest three weeks of her life. Her mother roamed about from room to room, toothless and inarticulate, unable to eat solid food, waiting for her lacerated gums to heal. She complained and mumbled almost incessantly, harassed by the thought of doctor’s and dentist’s bills which she declared over and over she saw no way of ever paying. Jeannette, chained to her bed, had to listen unhappily. Mrs. Sturgis gave her no respite. She refused to leave the house for fear of meeting a friend in the street who would discover her toothlessness. Alice went to market and ran the errands, while Mrs. Sturgis rocked back and forth, back and forth, beside Jeannette’s bed, picked at her darning, and complained of life. It was not like her mother, thought the daughter wearily; she of indomitable spirit, who had never been afraid of hardships, but rejoiced in overcoming them.
Letters from Roy brought the only alleviating spots in these long, tiring days. He wrote almost every day and there were numerous picture post-cards. His letters were full of assurances and young hopes. Jeannette loved his endearments, his underscored protestations, but the plans which he elaborately unfolded seemed so uncertain, their realization so improbable that they left her cold. She read the scrawled words in the immature script, and tried to conjure up a picture of him penning them. It eluded her. The boy in the Norfolk jacket with the stuck-up hair, blue eyes, and whimsical smile, that had so strangely fired her heart, had already become hazy and remote. Her own weak back and helplessness, her mother’s trembling cheeks and mumbled complaints were harsh realities, very close at hand. The summer sun blazed on unsparingly, and perspiration covered her arms and neck and trickled down between her breasts. Spring and young love, the glittering Avenue, walks and talks and murmured confidences that whipped the blood and caught the breath, were of a far distant yesterday. Was there ever a time when thoughts of this boy had kept her awake at nights, a time when at the memory of his kiss her tears had blinded her? It was some other Jeannette,—not the one who sighed wearily and wished Alice would keep the door shut, and not let in the flies to bother her.
§ 3
Slowly Nature reasserted herself. Strength returned, old hopes revived, youth throbbed again in the veins, life once more took on a pleasing aspect. The late August day, that found Jeannette making a cautious way toward the Park on her first venture from the house, was brilliant with warm but not too hot sunshine, and the foliage of trees and shrubbery in the Park vistas never appeared greener or more inviting.
Mrs. Sturgis’ false teeth had made a great improvement in her appearance, had rounded out her face, given strength to her jaw, and made her seem ten years younger. The little woman was delighted with the effect, and was now evincing a gratified interest in her appearance. Signor Bellini had returned earlier than he expected, had already started his Monday and Thursday classes, while Miss Loughborough’s Concentration School for Young Ladies was about to open its doors, and pupils were flocking back from their vacations. And lastly, and to the girl, most important of all, Roy was returning to New York.
He would arrive in the city in a few days, and she wondered how she would feel toward him when they met. As she sat upon a park bench, enjoying the sun and the toddling children playing in the soft gravel of the pathway near by, she asked herself if she cared. She could not tell. Of far more interest to her was the prospect of work again. She had been stifled all summer by illness and heat, but now she wanted to get back to the business world and win her independence anew. Her ambition was afire; she was all eagerness to have a job once more.... Roy? ... Well, it would be pleasant to have him making love to her again, to watch him tremble at her nearness.
But she found herself thrilling on the afternoon he was to see her. He had telephoned in the morning from the station, and his voice had sounded wonderfully sweet and eager. When his ring at the door announced him, her heart raced madly. Delicious tremors, one after another, coursed through her.
He came hurrying up the stairs and she met him in the studio. Their hands instantly found one another’s, and they stood so a moment, smiling happily and ardently into each other’s eyes; then she drifted into his arms, and it seemed the peace of the world had come.
Ah, she had forgotten how dear he was, how lovable, how sweet! It was good to have him take her to himself that way, and feel his thin arms about her, and have him hold her close against his young hard breast.