Part 58 (2/2)
”Now, wait, Maurice,” Lionel said, slowly, and in a still lower voice, though his eyes were afire. ”Wait and watch--closely, closely--don't breathe or speak. It is near twelve. Watch! Do not take your eyes off them; and at twelve o'clock, when you see one of the cups move, then you must seize it--seize it, and seize Nina's hand!--and hold her fast! Oh, I can tell you she will not leave us any more--not when I have spoken to her and told her how cruel it was of her to go away. I do not know where she is now; but at twelve, all of a sudden, there will be a kind of trembling of the air--that is Nina--for she has been here before; how long to twelve now, Maurice?” he asked, eagerly.
”Oh, it is a long time till twelve yet,” his friend said. ”I think, if I were you, I would try to sleep for an hour or two; and I'll go into the other room so as not to disturb you.”
”No, no, Maurice,” Lionel said, with panting vehemence. ”You must not stir! It is quite near, I tell you--it is close on twelve--watch the cups, Maurice, and be ready to spring up and seize her hand and hold her fast. Quite near twelve--surely I hear something--it is something outside the window--like stringed instruments--and waves, dark waves--no, no! Maurice, Maurice! it is in the next room!--it is some one sobbing!--it is Nina!--Nina!”
He uttered a loud shriek and struggled wildly to raise himself; but Maurice, with gentle pressure and persuasive words, got him to lie still.
”It is past twelve now, Linn; and you see there has been nothing. We must wait; and some day we will find out all about Nina for you. Of course you would like to know about your old companion. Oh, we'll find her, rest a.s.sured!”
Lionel had turned away, and was lying moaning and muttering to himself.
The only phrase his companion could make out was something about ”a wide, wide sea--and all dark.”
But Maurice, finding him now comparatively quiet, stealthily put back the various trinkets into the box and carried it into the other room.
And then, hearing no further sound, he remained there--remained until the nurse came down to take his place.
He told her what had occurred; but she was familiar with these things, and doubtless knew much better than himself how to deal with such emergencies. At the street-door he paused to light his pipe--his first smoke that day, and surely well-earned. Then he went away through the dark thoroughfares down to Westminster, not without much pity and sadness in his mind, also perhaps with some curious speculations--as to the lot of poor, luckless mortals, their errors and redeeming virtues, and the vagrant and cruel buffetings of fate.
CHAPTER XXIV.
FRIENDS IN NEED.
On the Monday morning matters were so serious that Mangan telegraphed down to Winstead; but the old doctor and his wife and Francie were already on their way to town. When they arrived in Piccadilly, and went into the sick-room, Lionel did not know them; most likely he merely confused them with the crowding phantoms of his brain. He was now in a high state of fever, but the delirium was not violent; he lay murmuring and moaning, and it was only chance phrases they could catch--about some one being lost--and a wide and dark sea--and so forth. Sometimes he fancied that Nina was standing at the door, and he would appeal piteously to her, and then sink back with a sigh, as if convinced once more that it was only a vision. The Winstead people took apartments for themselves at a hotel in Half-Moon Street; but of course they spent nearly all their time in this sitting-room, where they could do little but listen to the reports of the doctors, and wait and hope.
In the afternoon Mangan said,
”Francie, you're not used to sitting in-doors all day; won't you come out for a little stroll in the Park over there?”
”And I'm sure you want a breath of fresh air as much as any one, Mr.
Mangan,” the old lady said. ”What would my boy have done without you all this time?”
Francie at once and obediently put on her things, and she and Maurice went down-stairs and crossed the street and entered the Park, where they could walk up and down the unfrequented ways and talk as they pleased.
”I suppose you will be going down to the House of Commons almost directly?” she asked.
”Oh, no,” he answered. ”I've begged off. I could not think of getting to work while Linn is so ill as that.”
”Do you know what I have been thinking all day, Maurice?” she said, gently. ”When I saw you with the doctors, and when I heard of all you have done since Sat.u.r.day morning--well, I could not help thinking that there must be something fine about Lionel to have secured him such a friend.”
He looked at her with some surprise.
”But you have been his friend--all these years!” he said.
”Ah, that's different; we were brought up together. Tell me--the Nina he is always talking about--I suppose that is the Italian girl who was at the theatre, and whom he knew in Naples--he used to write home about her--”
[Ill.u.s.tration: ”_He uttered a loud shriek, and struggled wildly to raise himself._”]
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