Part 4 (2/2)
Whitmore lived.
His visits to the little Harlem flat had long ceased to have more than a semblance of being professional, and it was an open secret that he wished to make Margaret his wife. Margaret said no, though with a heightened color and a quickened breath--which told at least herself how easily the ”no” might have been a ”yes.”
Dr. Littlejohn was young and poor, and he had only his profession, for all he was heir to one of the richest women on the avenue; and Margaret refused to burden him with what she knew it would mean to marry her. In spite of argument, therefore, and a pair of earnest brown eyes that pleaded even more powerfully, she held to her convictions and continued to say no.
All this, however, did not prevent Dr. Littlejohn from making frequent visits to the Whitmore home, and always his coming meant joy to three weary, troubled hearts. To-day he brought a great handful of pink carnations and dropped them into the lap of the blind woman.
”Sweets to the sweet!” he cried gayly, as he patted the slim hand on the arm of the chair.
”Doctor Ned--you dear boy! Oh, how lovely!” exclaimed Mrs. Whitmore, burying her face in the fragrant flowers. ”And, doctor, I want to speak to you,” she broke off earnestly. ”I want you to talk to Meg and Kathie.
Perhaps they will listen to you. I want them to go out more. Tell them, please, that I don't need them all the time now.”
”Dear me, how independent we are going to be!” laughed the doctor. ”And so we don't need any more attention now, eh?”
”Betty will do.”
”Betty?” It was hard, sometimes, for the doctor to remember.
”The maid,” explained Mrs. Whitmore; ”though, for that matter, there might as well be no maid--the girls never let her do a thing for me.”
”No?” returned the doctor easily, sure now of where he stood. ”But you don't expect me to interfere in this housekeeping business!”
”Somebody must,” urged Mrs. Whitmore. ”The girls must leave me more. It isn't as if we were poor and couldn't hire nurses and maids. I should die if it were like that, and I were such a burden.”
”Mother, _dearest_!” broke in Margaret feverishly, with an imploring glance toward her sister and the doctor.
”Oh, by the way,” interposed the doctor airily, ”it has occurred to me that the very object of my visit to-day is right along the lines of what you ask. I want Miss Margaret to go driving with me. I have a call to make out Was.h.i.+ngton Heights way.”
”Oh, but--” began Margaret, and paused at a gesture from her mother.
”There aren't any 'buts' about it,” declared Mrs. Whitmore. ”Meg shall go.”
”Of course she'll go!” echoed Katherine. And with three against her, Margaret's protests were in vain.
Mrs. Whitmore was nervous that night. She could not sleep.
It seemed to her that if she could get up and walk, back and forth, back and forth, she could rest afterward. She had not stepped alone yet, to be sure, since the accident, but, after all, the girls did little more than guide her feet, and she was sure that she could walk alone if she tried.
The more she thought of it the more she longed to test her strength.
Just a few steps back and forth, back and forth--then sleep. She was sure she could sleep then. Very quietly, that she might not disturb the sleepers in the bedroom beyond, the blind woman sat up in bed and slipped her feet to the floor.
Within reach were her knit slippers and the heavy shawl always kept at the head of her bed. With trembling hands she put them on and rose upright.
At last she was on her feet, and alone. To a woman who for ten years had depended on others for almost everything but the mere act of breathing, it was joy unspeakable. She stepped once, twice, and again along the side of her bed; then she stopped with a puzzled frown--under her feet was the unyielding, unfamiliar straw matting. She took four more steps, hesitatingly, and with her arms outstretched at full length before her.
The next instant she recoiled and caught her breath sharply; her hands had encountered a wall and a window--_and there should have been no wall or windows there_!
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