CHAPTER XX
THE RUBY WINE
Oh, the dismal dawn that woke me, it came through the window that I had left wide open. I sat up in bed. I was still dressed. My spurs had torn the coverlet, the trumpet and its blood-red silken cord lay upon the floor. The wind blew in, shaking the curtains mournfully. I saw it all at a glance. I remembered everything—the trumpeter had returned. Oh, it was awful, that moment of cringing terror. It seemed as if fate had been crawling at me slowly during the last three days. It seemed as if last night she had made a fearful bound, and now, like a tiger, was crouching for the final spring.
I had done it with my own lips, I had blown the death-trumpet for Geraldine. And now that voice came back that I heard at first, saying, "Remember, Geraldine is a boy." Ah, yes, I remembered it now, now that I had heralded to Geraldine the fate to which all the eldest boys of the Wilder family were doomed.
I threw myself face down on the pillows, weeping as if my heart would break; but of what use were tears? I had elected to play the part of a man, tears were out of place. I stopped weeping and dried my eyes. What was to be done? how could I save this child?
"Only one way," said a voice in my head, "leave her—you alone can kill her, so leave her."
I would,—I would leave her. I determined on that and rose from the bed; but, oh God help me, I determined to go first to her to say good-bye. Was it wrong? ask it of yourself. How—how could I leave this child, whose life was dearer to me than my own, how could I leave her without saying good-bye? Do you know what it means to leave a person you love, to leave for ever without saying good-bye? Could a mother leave her infant never to see it again without first kissing its tiny hands, its lips, its eyes? I could have torn my heart out with my own hands, but I could not have left Geraldine without saying good-bye.
I came to the great pier-glass and I saw myself—the cavalier. I leaned my head against it and against his, and I gazed out of the window at the dull grey sky; still another day of the damp, dark, sorrowful weather. The clock on the mantel pointed to the hour—quarter to six.
"I shall kiss her once and say good-bye and leave her for ever," I murmured to myself, but the words seemed to have little meaning. "I shall go to her now," I said, standing upright and addressing my own reflection in the glass, "for the sooner it is over the better."
I left the room. The passage was dark, but I felt my way with my hand. Down the stairs I came, across the hall, down the little corridor. I lifted the curtain and knocked. "Come in," said a voice.