Poppea of the Post-Office

by Mabel Osgood Wright

When the next morning came, Poppea kept her bed for the first time since the childhood days of whooping-cough and measles. From sunrise waves of intense heat swept the village and outlying country, intensified rather than veiled by the low-hanging mists. Yet this alone could not account for the flushed cheeks and restless sparkle of her eyes, or the weariness of limb that almost refused to let her move. The fact was that she had not slept, but each hour of the summer night had brought a new phantom with which she had struggled. In so far as it was possible, she had ceased to dwell upon the theme of The Mystery of the Name, now it had returned with new force to haunt her, and with it the persecution of John Angus. This in itself was hard enough to bear, but it meant also complete separation from Philip, who had come to be such a part of her inner life that no one else seemed fully to comprehend that even the idea of readjustment was impossible.

The unintentional abruptness of Bradish Winslow in stating the pith of Angus's complaints against the post-office, by its very shock had brought her face to face with the fact that she had tried to conceal even from herself. Oliver Gilbert was swiftly coming to a time when, if he did not resign, his age and slowness of motion might surely be cast up against him for some trivial oversight that would, in a younger man, pass unnoticed.

For a time the danger of dismissal was probably averted; that is, if Winslow's attitude of apparent sympathy was sincere. Was he to be trusted? Standing face to face with him the night before, it had not occurred to her to doubt him. Away from him, a certain sustaining magnetism coming from his entire confidence in himself, blended with an agreeable personality, was lacking, and Poppea wondered if he had read her aright, or taken her justification as a clever bit of acting. And why not, if John Angus could so misjudge her!

Other women of her age and naturally emotional temperament might take peeps into the promised land of love and romance even before the gate opened and they were bidden to enter. The knowledge of her own name was the only key to the gate for her; she had long since resolved this, that evening at the opera when the Knight of the Grail, to her a real personality, had disappeared. But since then the doubt had come to her, suppose that the knowing proved to her also a final barrier instead of the key?

Oliver Gilbert was appalled at Poppea's indisposition, which he viewed in the light of a positive disaster. Leaving his six o'clock cup of coffee untasted, he went about putting up the early mail with shaking hands and a lack of precision that might well have called down criticism, had it been observed. Neither did he draw comfort from Mrs. Shandy's common-sense assurance that "Miss Poppy is only a bit done up with the strong heat coming all of a sudden, and having to sing before such a gathering of the quality for the first time. When she's rested a bit and had a nice cup of breakfast tea and some toast, she'll be quite another thing."

The doctor must be had! Nothing else would satisfy Gilbert. So, about eleven o'clock, when Miss Emmy drove down in the barouche to tell Poppea the pleasant gossip about the party, together with the comments upon her singing, encountering Bradish Winslow in spotless white clothes sauntering in the same direction, Dr. Morewood's chaise came up the Westboro road and halted at the gate of the post-office house a little ahead of them.

Miss Emmy, on hearing that he had called to see Poppea, followed him into the house, while Winslow went into the office and, over the buying of a newspaper, drew Gilbert into conversation.

Whether it was the tea and toast that had the predicted effect, or the fact that Poppea had finally acquired the mastery of herself and remembered that Winslow had promised to look at the post-office and its master through his own eyes and judgment, at the moment that Miss Emmy was ushered into the parlor she heard, through the open window, Dr. Morewood's voice talking to Poppea in the room above.

"Something is worrying you, child; get away from here for a week and look at things from a different place," he said. "If it's too lively for you at Felton Manor, go over to the Mills. Dear little Mrs. Oldys is nearly down ill through homesickness for Hugh, and the next best thing to seeing him will be to see some one who knows him to whom she can read his letters. It'll do you good to go up there, with that view over the Moosatuck to the hills that every sunrise is like a glimpse of the promised land, and it will be a perfect godsend to her. Do you know, sometimes I think that plucky little woman is simply clinging to life by the love she has for her husband and son. I've been so impressed with the idea this spring that about a month ago I wrote Hugh asking him if he couldn't shorten his trip and come home early in August, so as to give some leeway before he goes to his new work in September.

"I am going up to the Oldyses' now; may I tell Madam that you're coming, say this afternoon?"