At first I would say: "Dearest, you must be quiet and try to go to sleep."—"But I can't leave the meeting!" He would look at me in such distress. So I learned my part, and at each new discussion he would get into, I would suggest: "Here's Will Ogburn just come—he'll take charge of the meeting for you. You come home with me and go to sleep." So he would introduce Will to the gathering, and add: "Gentlemen, my wife wants me to go home with her and go to sleep—good-bye." For a few moments he would be quiet. Then, "O my Lord, something to investigate! What is it this time?" I would cut in hastily: "The Government feels next week will be plenty of time for this investigation." He would look at me seriously. "Did you ever know the Government to give you a week's time to begin?" Then, "Telegrams—more telegrams! Nobody keeps their word, nobody."
About six o'clock in the morning I could wait no longer and called the doctor. He pronounced it pneumonia—an absolutely different case from any he had ever seen: no sign of it the day before, though it was what he had been watching for all along. Every hospital in town was full. A splendid trained nurse came at once to the house—"the best nurse in the whole city," the doctor announced with relief.
Wednesday afternoon the crisis seemed to have passed. That whole evening he was himself, and I—I was almost delirious from sheer joy. To hear his dear voice again just talking naturally! He noticed the nurse for the first time. He was jovial—happy. "I am going to get some fun out of this now!" he smiled. "And oh, won't we have a time, my girl, while I am convalescing!" And we planned the rosiest weeks any one ever planned. Thursday the nurse shaved him—he not only joked and talked like his dear old self—he looked it as well. (All along he had been cheerful—always told the doctor he was "feeling fine"; never complained of anything. It amused the doctor so one morning, when he was leaning over listening to Carl's heart and lungs, as he lay in more or less of a doze and partial delirium. A twinkle suddenly came into Carl's eye. "You sprung a new necktie on me this morning, didn't you?" Sure enough, it was new.)
Thursday morning the nurse was preparing things for his bath in another room and I was with Carl. The sun was streaming in through the windows and my heart was too contented for words. He said: "Do you know what I've been thinking of so much this morning? I've been thinking of what it must be to go through a terrible illness and not have some one you loved desperately around. I say to myself all the while: 'Just think, my girl was here all the time—my girl will be here all the time!' I've lain here this morning and wondered more than ever what good angel was hovering over me the day I met you."
I put this in because it is practically the last thing he said before delirium came on again, and I love to think of it. He said really more than that.
In the morning he would start calling for me early—the nurse would try to soothe him for a while, then would call me. I wanted to be in his room at night, but they would not let me—there was an unborn life to be thought of those days, too. As soon as I reached his bed, he would clasp my hand and hold it oh, so tight. "I've been groping for you all night—all night! Why don't they let me find you?" Then, in a moment, he would not know I was there. Daytimes I had not left him five minutes, except for my meals. Several nights they had finally let me be by him, anyway. Saturday morning for the first time since the crisis the doctor was encouraged. "Things are really looking up," and "You go out for a few moments in the sun!"
I walked a few blocks to the Mudgetts' in our department, to tell them the good news, and then back; but my heart sank to its depths again as soon as I entered Carl's room. The delirium always affected me that way: to see the vacant stare in his eyes—no look of recognition when I entered.
The nurse went out that afternoon. "He's doing nicely," was the last thing she said. She had not been gone half an hour—it was just two-fifteen—and I was lying on her bed watching Carl, when he called, "Buddie, I'm going—come hold my hand." O my God—I dashed for him, I clung to him, I told him he could not, must not go—we needed him too terribly, we loved him too much to spare him. I felt so sure of it, that I said: "Why, my love is enough to keep you here!"
He would not let me leave him to call the doctor. I just knelt there holding both his hands with all my might, talking, talking, telling him we were not going to let him go. And then, at last, the color came back into his face, he nodded his head a bit, and said, "I'll stay," very quietly. Then I was able to rush for the stairs and tell Mrs. Willard to telephone for the doctor. Three doctors we had that afternoon. They reported the case as "dangerous, but not absolutely hopeless." His heart, which had been so wonderful all along, had given out. That very morning the doctor had said: "I wish my pulse was as strong as that!" and there he lay—no pulse at all. They did everything: our own doctor stayed till about ten, then left, with Carl resting fairly easily. He lived only a block away.
About one-thirty the nurse had me call the doctor again. I could see things were going wrong. Once Carl started to talk rather loud. I tried to quiet him and he said: "Twice I've pulled and fought and struggled to live just for you [one of the times had been during the crisis]. Let me just talk if I want to. I can't make the fight a third time—I'm so tired."