Part 43 (1/2)

Oh! Mrs. Tams”--the woman was just bustling out of the bedroom, duster in hand--”will you toddle down to the works and tell them I'm not coming?”

”Eh, mester!” breathed Mrs. Tams, looking at him. ”It's a mercy it's no worse.”

”Yes,” Louis teased her, ”but you go and look at the basin downstairs, Mrs. Tams. That'll give you food for thought.”

Shaking her head, she smiled at Rachel, because the master had spirit enough to be humorous with her.

In the bedroom, Louis said, ”I might be more comfortable if I took some of my clothes off.”

Thereupon he abandoned himself to Rachel. She did as she pleased with him, and he never opposed. Seven bruises could be counted on his left side. He permitted himself to be formally and completely put to bed.

He drank half a gla.s.s of hot milk, and then said that he could not possibly swallow any more. Everything had been done that ought to be done and that could be done. And Rachel kept a.s.suring herself that there was not the least cause for anxiety. She also told herself that she had been a ninny once that morning, and that once was enough.

Nevertheless, she remained apprehensive, and her apprehensions increased. It was Louis' unnatural manageableness that disturbed her.

And when, about three hours later, he murmured, ”Old girl, I feel pretty bad.”

”I knew it,” she said to herself.

His complaint was like a sudden thunderclap in her ears, after long faint rumblings of a storm.

Towards tea-time she decided that she must send for the doctor again.

Louis indeed demanded the doctor. He said that he was very ill. His bruised limbs and his damaged face caused him a certain amount of pain. It was not, however, the pain that frightened him, but a general and profound sensation of illness. He could describe no symptoms.

There were indeed no symptoms save the ebbing of vitality. He said he had never in his life felt as he felt then. His appearance confirmed the statement. The look of his eyes was tragic. His hands were pale. His agonized voice was extremely distressing to listen to. The bandages heightened the whole sinister effect. Dusk shadowed the room.

Rachel lit the gas and drew the blinds. But in a few moments Louis complained of the light, and she had to lower the jet.

The sounds of the return of Mrs. Tams could be heard below. Mrs.

Tams had received instructions to bring the doctor back with her, but Rachel's ear caught no sign of the doctor. She went out to the head of the stairs. The doctor simply must be there. It was not conceivable that when summoned he should be ”out” twice in one day, but so it was.

Mrs. Tams, whispering darkly from the dim foot of the stairs, said that Mrs. Yardley hoped that he would be in shortly, but could not be sure.

”What am I to do?” thought Rachel. ”This is a crisis. Everything depends on me. What shall I do? Shall I send for another doctor?” She decided to risk the chances and wait. It would be too absurd to have two doctors in the house. What would people say of her and of Louis, if the rumour ran that she had lost her head and filled the house with doctors when the case had no real gravity? People would say that she was very young and inexperienced, and a freshly married wife, and so on. And Rachel hated to be thought young or freshly married. Besides, another doctor might be ”out” too. And further, the case could not be truly serious. Of course, if afterwards it did prove to be serious, she would never forgive herself.

”He'll be here soon,” she said cheerfully, to Louis in the bedroom.

”If he isn't--” moaned Louis, and stopped.

She gave him some brandy, against his will. Then, taking his wrist to feel it, she felt his fingers close on her wrist, as if for aid. And she sat thus on the bed holding his hand in the gloom of the lowered gas.

IV

His weakness and his dependence on her gave her a feeling of kind superiority. And also her own physical well-being was such that she could not help condescending towards him. She cared for a trustful, helpless little dog. She thought a great deal about him; she longed ardently to be of a.s.sistance to him; she had an acute sense of her responsibility and her duty. Yet, notwithstanding all that, her brain was perhaps chiefly occupied with herself and her own att.i.tude towards existence. She became mentally and imaginatively active to an intense degree. She marvelled at existence as she had never marvelled before, and while seeming suddenly to understand it better she was far more than ever baffled by it. Was it credible that the accident of a lad losing control of a horse could have such huge and awful consequences on two persons utterly unconnected with the lad? A few seconds sooner, a few seconds later--and naught would have occurred to Louis, but he must needs be at exactly a certain spot at exactly a certain instant, with the result that now she was in torture! If this, if that, if the other--Louis would have been well and gay at that very moment, instead of a broken organism humiliated on a bed and clinging to her like a despairing child.

The rapidity and variety of events in her life again startled her, and once more she went over them. The disappearance of the bank-notes was surely enough in itself. But on the top of that fell the miracle of her love affair. Her marriage was like a dream of romance to her, untrue, incredible. Then there was the terrific episode of Julian on the previous night. One would have supposed that after that the sensationalism of events would cease. But, no! The unforeseeable had now occurred, something which reduced all else to mere triviality.

And yet what had in fact occurred? Acquaintances, in recounting her story, would say that she had married her mistress's nephew, that there had been trouble between Louis and Julian about some bank-notes, and that Louis had had a bicycle accident. Naught more! A most ordinary chronicle! And if he died now, they would say that Louis had died within a month of the wedding and how sad it was! Husbands indubitably do die, young wives indubitably are transformed into widows--daily event, indeed!... She seemed to perceive the deep, hidden meaning of life. There were three Rachels in her--one who pitied Louis, one who pitied herself, and one who looked on and impartially comprehended. The last was scarcely unhappy--only fervently absorbed in the prodigious wonder of the hour.

”Can't you do anything?” Louis murmured.