Old David was going to die, but because those who watched him practised an art of cheerful concealment, it was a very happy time for him, quite the happiest time he had known since boyhood.
Propped up in bed, he watched all that went on about him, and he looked at the flowers in the window. He knew who had sent the flowers and, when he appeared, Simon Hart had to bear the scrutiny of a pair of old eyes that surveyed him unwaveringly from the pillow. When Rachel brought the visitor around to the bedside, a look of sly satisfaction radiated from the old man's features. Interest and an eager zest for life still flourished in him; though Death held him hand and foot he was too true a poet to heed the approach of so material a guest. The last days of his life were enveloped in ineffable peace. Wrapped about in comforts, he had no knowledge of the tragedy of Rachel's existence, but rested in the serene belief that Heaven itself provided him with doctors, medicines, luxuries. His poor darkened brain worked with incredible slowness, and it was touching to behold him enjoying a dainty meal that Rachel had contrived to provide for him. Smiling and fresh, with a napkin tucked under his chin, he would point out such food on the tray as appealed to his fancy; then she would lift it to his lips, feeding him as one feeds a bird. And often the poor child's face was far paler than his and her hands trembled with hunger.
Only her absorbing, desperate love for him sustained her. For this grandfather, who in the enthusiasm of his heart was so like a little child, Rachel willingly would have laid down her life. No sacrifice was beyond her; and as the old man's soul was enveloped in that atmosphere of rare and delicate perceptions that heralds the final liberation, her soul, through its love, was permitted entrance into the same region of mysterious joys; so that up to the last moment they bore each other company.
Sometimes, troubled by the thickness of his speech, old David looked at his young companion with piteous eyes; but the condition was the result of weakness, she assured him; later the words would come. To amuse him she searched the papers for humorous anecdotes and even invented funny little stories of her own. Then how they laughed together! The room reëchoed with such merry peals it seemed Death took the hint and kept at a distance. Indeed, the old man entering that world of which we know nothing, and the young girl surrounded by the evils of this, by their very innocence and helplessness held at bay all the menacing powers of darkness, and under that attic roof, in the midst of a sordid city, they lived a life more profound and universal than its thousands of passionate men and women thronging the streets below.
When Simon Hart called, as he did every evening, it seemed to him that all the needs of the sick man were met. He sent flowers and fruit for old David, but a sense of delicacy kept him from offering Rachel financial assistance. Though he had disliked particularly asking a favour of his cousin, Julia Burgdorf, through her influence he was able to obtain for the young girl piece-work in an establishment that made a specialty of hand-painted trifles. This appealed to him as the most considerate way of helping her. Little did he realize that nursing left Rachel scant opportunity for the painting which required concentration. But by forcing herself to do without rest and almost without food, by employing every spare moment in doing all sorts of simple, ill-paid work that could be carried on at home, such as the directing of circulars and envelopes, mending and sewing for the neighbours, the impossible thing was accomplished. In quarters, half-dollars, dollars, the necessary money was swept together to cover the needs of the sick man. It was one of those prodigious, superhuman struggles constantly attempted by love. But of this struggle, though he came daily to the apartment, Simon Hart realized little. With the instinctive dread that characterizes persons of supersensitive nature, he had trained himself not to see to the bottom of things, not to investigate hearts too deeply. While watching Rachel with melancholy, ambiguous eyes, he was practically blind to the difficulty of her situation.
His sense of loneliness, always painful, was aggravated now, and in her presence he was tormented by an inexpressible need of intimate companionship. He could not bear to have her leave the room; he was jealous of the doctor and Emily Short, since they took something of her from him. And how little he received!—a word when he came and when he left and now and then a smile. When Rachel cast on him a smile from swiftly-parted tremulous lips, a smile that vanished ere it had scarce taken form, Simon's restlessness increased and his desire for affection became a feverish demand. Fortunate for her that it was himself rather than another who saw her placed as she was. And reflecting that many a man of the ravening-wolf type, in his place would have sought to take advantage of her poverty, of her unprotected state, he grew hot with anger. But she stood small chance of meeting such a one, and after all Emily Short was a defence. Then the idea of marrying the girl presented itself, looming mirage-like on the horizon of his mind, and he felt that he was becoming ridiculous. He saw himself with the eyes of that world in which Julia Burgdorf and his business associates were the chief figures. The victim of a little unknown waif—not merely her victim, her slave. In order to break the spell he forbade himself to go to see her, and, that he might keep to the resolution, he started without warning on a trip to Bermuda.
At first Nora Gage, influenced by shrewd calculations, acted in an unexpected fashion. During the fortnight that old David lay between life and death, Nora each day doled out a little money to Rachel. But later, as the invalid began to improve, she stole into his room a hundred times a day and noted the gathering life in his face with eyes as watchful as a snake's. Sometimes she even extended a hand and tested his pulse. Devotion to comfort was the ruling motive of Nora's life, and, foreseeing a future wherein comfort was threatened, fear seized upon her very vitals; and an agitation spread outward through the whole bulk of her flesh. Nor was her situation undeserving of sympathy. In vain Emily Short promised to reimburse her for all expenditures on old David's account when the fall trade in hats should open; Nora was sceptical of the security, as she was sceptical, finally, of Simon Hart's intentions.
"He don't mean a thing, I'm sure of it," she muttered. "The idea of thinking he'd marry her! I've been a fool." And Nora sighed heavily as the alluring vision of the permanent home she had intended to demand in Simon Hart's house, in return for the assistance she had rendered old David, vanished in thin air.
Her generosity came abruptly to an end. The doctor might order new medicines and old David, with the innocent egotism of the sick, demand the comforts to which he had become accustomed, Nora was unmoved. Gloating, she waited for Rachel to make an appeal. But the other, aware of the nature with which she had to deal, was silent.
"Proud—proud to the end! Well, let her starve," Nora soliloquized, and took herself to the public parks,—anywhere to escape the atmosphere of gloom and terror that for her pervaded the apartment.