If only Harry were not coming into her life again!
But it was not ended—for weeks. And then one day, after a brief silence had come the word that he had been ill. A wave of influenza was sweeping the city and had seized him. She was not to worry. But she did worry—and returned immediately, only to find him far along the path which he was never to retrace. He was so ill. And worse, a strange despondency based on the thought that he was never to get well, had seized him. He had felt when she left, or so he said, that something were sure to happen. They might not ever, really, be together again. It had been so hard for him to do without her.
He had added that he was sorry to be so poor a fighter, to bring her back from her work. Her work! And he ill!
The immense wall these hotels made along the park!
And then against the utmost protest of her soul had come the end, a conclusion so sudden and unexpected that it had driven despair like metal into her very soul. Hour after hour and under her very eyes, her protesting if not restraining hands and thoughts, he had grown weaker. Though he knew, he seemed to wish to deny it, until at last his big dear eyes fixed upon her, he had gone, looking as though he wished to say something.
This wretchedly wealthy West Side!
It was that look, the seeking in it, that wishing to remain with her that was written there, that had haunted her and did still. It was as though he had wished to say: “I do not want to go! I do not want to go!”
And then, half-dead, she had flung herself upon him. With her hands she had tried to draw him back, until she was led away. For days she was too ill to know, and only his grave—chosen by strangers!—had brought it all back. And then the long days! Never again would life be the same. For the first time in her life she had been happy. A bowl of joy had been placed in her eager fingers, only to be dashed from them. Yes, once more now she was alone and would remain so, thrust back upon herself. And worse, with the agonizing knowledge of what beauty might be. Life had lost its lustre. What matter if others told of her beauty, if one or many sought to make her life less bare?
This stodgy porter always at the door in his showy braid! Why might not such as he die instead?
But then her mother and sister, learning of her despair, had come to her. Only since there was nothing that any pleasure, or aspect of life could offer her, the days rolled drearily,—meaninglessly. And only because of what was still missing in her mother’s life, material comfort, had she changed. It had been with the thought of helping her mother that after a year she had returned to the city and the stage, but exhausted, moping, a dreary wanderer amid old and broken dreams.