Annabel's answer was a vague uncomprehending stare. Then she began to understand. Mrs. West supposed her consumed with anxiety for her daughter's safety, whereas the possibility that Diantha might die had hardly occurred to her. She found herself wondering if she were unlike all other women, an abnormality in her selfishness. In the larger matters Annabel had remained contemptuously indifferent to the opinion of her sex, though she would have found their criticism of her personal appearance disquieting. But now she was conscious of an unaccustomed sense of relief that Mrs. West could not read her thoughts.
"I don't want—anything," she repeated mechanically, and Thad's mother departed with obvious reluctance. In five minutes she was back with a cup of tea which Annabel swallowed in hopes of thus purchasing immunity from further kindly attentions. And Mrs. West, bearing away the empty tea-cup, carried too, a better opinion of Annabel Sinclair than she would have believed possible.
"I never thought she cared anything much for Diantha," she told Persis who had dropped in several times during the day to see how matters were progressing. "But I must say, I did her an injustice. She's been pretty nearly crazy all day. She looks like a ghost."
"Well, she's Diantha's mother when all's said and done," Persis responded. Happiness makes for tolerance. With all her charity for the wrong-doer, Persis had made an exception of Annabel Sinclair. But now the years of fatness, following instead of preceding the lean years, the overflowing fulness of her heart and life had taught her new indulgence. She was capable of believing that there was good in the woman.
The afternoon dragged cruelly. Now and then some faint sound reached Annabel, vaguely suggestive of the battle which must be waged for every new existence, and each time the sagging body of the woman stiffened, and her breath grew hurried. Once Thad passed her window, his young face set and white, and his eyes reddened as if from weeping. Annabel shrank away fearful that his glance might fall on her, but the fixed eyes of the young husband saw only his wife's girlish face as he had seen it last, colorless, quivering, undaunted.
It was not far from four o'clock when the sound of hurrying feet quickened Annabel's lagging pulses. A door shut quickly and then another. Some one was hurrying down the hall; some one who brought news. Annabel found herself on her feet. And then, instinctively she caught at the back of her chair to support herself, for the floor was undulating and the sunny room had grown dark.
Out of the shapeless blur in which her surroundings blended, a face took shape, the face of Mrs. West, wet with tears and radiant with smiles. It was she who had sped so lightly down the long hall as if joy had given wings to her feet.
"It's a boy!" She laughed out the three exultant words and hurried back to some interrupted task. Annabel continued to stand. When at length she released her grip of the chair, her fingers were numb and stiff. The thought crossed her mind that now she was at liberty to go home, since her grandson had come into the world, but the effort seemed beyond her strength. She sank into the chair again, half closing her eyes. The poignant pain of the past hours had changed to an overwhelming listlessness. She was too tired to think any longer, too tired even to suffer.
A brisk knock at the door roused her from her apathy sufficiently for a resentful wish that they would leave her to herself. Then the door opened and Persis entered. Her face wore the look that had impressed Annabel on the face of Mrs. West, that look of supreme satisfaction, blended with a curious, vicarious pride, and with it all, something that told of tears held back. Annabel's eyes went from that radiant look to the shawl-draped bundle in Persis' arms. She put out her hand as if to ward off a danger.
Persis halted, gazing in consternation at the wreck of Annabel. In that shallow face the record of mental anguish was so unmistakable that the other woman felt a pang of self-reproach.