A Reaping

by E. F. Benson

‘That’s all right. Now when your breakfast comes, eat it, and read a book if you can, or go and garden. I am sure those roses of yours want looking after, and I tell you it’s a hard thing for a man in your position, and a thing which we doctors respect, to go and occupy himself. If you can’t, you can’t, but you might have a try.’

The servant brought in a tray before many minutes, and with it the morning paper. When I had eaten, I took it up and looked at it. There was no news, but the middle page contained an account of a visit to Vesuvius by an English Prince. He ‘honoured’ the volcano with a visit. And then I knew that I had seen the paper before. But when? Years and years ago, or this morning?

What the doctor had said to me needed no time or thought for realizing it. I felt as if I had known it all along—known it all my life. But—what happened next, if that all happened long ago? Was the room overhead the chamber of death or the chamber of birth? Next door to it was the nursery, with its Noah’s ark and its soldiers and its rocking-horse. Who going to ride on that? And the dolls’-house, with its tottering inhabitants—who next was to play with those, and open the wall? Oh, Helen, Helen, you and your child, will it be? Or will it be you and I again, but after a long time, hoping once more? Or—dear God, no, not that!

Daffodil-day, and its sisters of the spring! And Rose-day will come next month. Roses ... heaped for the beloved’s bed. Dear God, not that: it does not mean that bed. Indeed—indeed it does not. You have so many souls already in Your house of many mansions. Give us a few more years together, for they are so sweet, and a thousand years in Your sight are but as yesterday. And we should so like a young thing, one of our own, in the house. But ... thank You very much for the years that have been so sweet. They have been—they have been. And, please don’t let her suffer or be frightened.

Then I went across the lawn and into the rose-garden. Though we had been very industrious there, I never saw yet the rose-tree on which there is nothing to be done, and for a little my hands made themselves busy. Then quite suddenly it all became impossible, and there was nothing in the world except what the doctor had told me, and floating on the top of that ‘Humpty-Dumpty, Humpty-Dumpty.’

So it was within the hour that I got back again to the house, and the doctor had not yet returned. I missed something familiar on the lawn, without at once knowing what it was, and then I saw that the birds’ breakfast was not there. That took me to the dining-room, where I found lunch was already laid, and with bread-crumb and little bits of cheese, and cold meat mixed, I made a plateful for them, though, as you know, it was the last day of May, and I suppose it was but pauperism among the thrushes that I encouraged. But Helen all these days had done so. I knew she would not like them to miss their provision.

Soon after—so soon that the news of their belated meal had not yet become public among the birds—the doctor returned. I heard him go upstairs, and after that I crept into the hall, and sat down on the lowest step of the seventeen that led to the landing. Legs used to jump down them in two bounds, taking eight steps first, and then nine, and get up (with a run) in three—two sixes and a five.... What am I maundering about? And before very long I must have been sitting higher up the stairs, for I could see out of the window on the staircase. The dog-cart had drawn away from the door into the shade, and the groom had got down, and was gently stroking the mare’s nose. Then he laid his smooth young cheek against it, and she stood quite still, liking it. I expect he is kind to her.

The sun had swung round farther to the west, and it came in through the window. But now I was nearly at the top of the stairs; there were but three above where I sat. The house was very still; below me on the ground-floor there had been no step or sign of life, and there was nothing from behind the second door to the left just above me. Then came the sharp tingle of an electric bell. There was only one room from which it could have come.

I tapped very gently, though my heart beat so that I thought it must have been a hammer-noise to those inside. The door opened a chink, and a level, quiet voice said: ‘Some hot water, please—very hot.’ Perhaps a minute afterwards I tapped again, and a hand took the can of hot water from me.

I went back again, this time to the top step, and still waited. Since I had done something, though it was but the handing of a can of hot water into the room, that nightmare of incoherent thoughts began to clear more completely, and, like some remembered sunlight breaking clouds, and shining with the serene quietude of eventide, Helen—she herself, no intercepted vision, no vision even of remembrance only or anxiousness—shone out. Whatever happened, she was I, and I was she, and the Will of God, whatever It might ordain for us, could not alter that. She and I, I think, have never feared anything when we were together, and surely of all days that life or death could hold for us, we could never be more together than to-day. So, surely, of all hours this is the one when fear should be farthest from us, for never have we been together like this. Yet, O my God, my God, since Christ was born of a woman, let Him go in there, the second door....