Part 4 (1/2)
”Take her and put her to bed in the best bedroom. Remember that she's now the mistress of this house.”
Nannie moved towards Isabel. For a woman, she was tall and brawny, but she was probably well past fifty, and Isabel certainly had not credited her with the capacity to do what she immediately did. She eyed the stranger for a moment in silence, then she asked, in the broadest Scotch:--
”Can't you walk by your own self?”
Isabel resented both the tone and the scrutiny.
”You know I can't.”
Without more ado the woman, stooping, put her arms about her and lifted her bodily from the chair as if she were some great child. Isabel was taken by surprise, and a little alarmed.
”You'll drop me!” she cried.
”I'll not drop you; you're nothing of a weight.”
As if to prove it, the old woman bore her from the room, across the landing, to another room on the other side, one which was in darkness. But Nannie seemed to know its geography by instinct.
She deposited her burden on what Isabel realised was a bed.
Striking a match on a box which she took from her pocket, she lit some candles which stood on the mantelshelf. Isabel, remaining where she had been placed, eyed her as she moved about.
”You're very strong.”
”I'm not so strong as once I was. There was a time when I'd have carried four of you, and thought nothing of it either. Now can you undress yourself, or will you be needing me to do it for you?”
”Thank you, I think I can undress myself; but if you would help me take the boot off my bad foot.”
Nannie bent over the foot which the other extended. She regarded it in silence, then, still without a word, she left the room. So soon as she was gone Isabel dragged the glove which contained her wedding-ring out of her belt, and the canvas bag which had come out of Mrs. Macconichie's tobacco jar from her bodice, and thrust them as far as possible under the bolster which was beneath the pillow on which she was reclining. Scarcely had she done this when Nannie reappeared, in her hands a pair of large scissors. With their aid she proceeded, still speechless, to cut, first, the laces of Isabel's boot, and then the boot itself, till it came away from her foot. As it came away she did what she boasted she had never before done in her life--she fainted. When she came to herself again she found that Nannie, who had apparently remained indifferent to the fact that her senses had left her, having bathed her foot and ankle, was putting the finis.h.i.+ng touches to the bandages in which she had swathed it. When the bandage was completed the old woman, still without vouchsafing a word, began to undress her, and did it with a deftness and neatness which would have done her credit had she played the part of lady's-maid her whole life long.
Almost before she knew it, she was ready for the sheets, and so soon as she was ready she was placed between them.
”You're very good to me,” she murmured, with a luxurious sigh, as she recognised what a delicious feeling it was to be between them.
”I'm not good to you--anyway I'm not wanting to be good to you.”
Isabel looked up with surprise; the tone was almost savage.
”Why not? Don't you think that you will like me?”
”Like you!--like you!”
The emphasis with which the words were repeated was unmistakable. It would have been difficult for scorn to have been more eloquent. Without condescending to further speech, as if everything had been said which could be said, Nannie moved towards the door. Isabel put a question to her as she reached it.
”Is my husband dead?”
Nannie turned swiftly round to her.
”Your--what?”
”My husband.”
”Your husband!--your husband!”