“Saint Christopher bore a little Child out of the water, across to safety, you know. Let us hope he will bless this Christopher’s rescue,” she said, softly.
Kit stared. “What nice things you think of; sweet, womanly, lovely things,” he said, simply, and took Anne home.
CHAPTER XII
Making Alive
DURING three days and for as many long nights Anne Dallas lived intensely in unrealities. Richard Latham was not inclined to talk; she herself was submerged in feeling that silenced words. It seemed to her that it blanketed thought, yet all the time she was thinking intently and, unknown to herself, was reaching conclusions. She worked fast, for Richard was working fast; she rapidly took down notes for the first part of his third act, and was aware somewhere in her brain behind her absorption that he was dictating to her lines which surpassed himself at his previous best.
Little Anne Berkley was dangerously ill. Pneumonia had developed on the second day after her pitiful penance, and, little-Anne-like, she was having it hard. Anne Dallas and Richard Latham were surprised to find what a large place in their days and hearts the child had filled. The thin little body as it lay prostrate in its fight for life cast a shadow over the house in Latham Street. His anxiety stimulated Richard to better work, but in Anne’s mind fear for little Anne aggregated to her personal anxiety and benumbed her further. The world had grown still, hushed by anxiety; she was feeling so intensely that she seemed not to feel.
Nor did the shadow of little Anne’s suffering darken only the poet’s house. Kit was so afflicted by her danger that he hovered constantly around the Berkley door, getting bulletins many times a day, bringing preposterous gifts to the child who could not see them.
Once, when she was sleeping, Mrs. Berkley took Kit up to look at her. She lay with a disreputable doll beside her, her face so pinched, her breathing so laboured, the look of suffering, of imminent death so stamped upon her that Kit groaned aloud. Mrs. Berkley led him away as little Anne stirred.
“It’s bad, Kit, dear, but we are hoping and praying,” she said with such a brave smile that when Kit got down to where Antony Paul was waiting for him he broke down.
Peter sat with his head in his hands, bowed over his knees. He looked up fiercely as he heard Kit sob.