Part 64 (2/2)

”He does it on purpose, you know,” Edwin whispered casually. ”I'll just get him to bed, and then I'll be down.”

Albert went, with a 'good night' to Darius that received no answer.

TWO.

In the bedroom, Darius had sunk on to the cus.h.i.+oned ottoman. Edwin shut the door.

”Now then!” said Edwin encouragingly, yet commandingly. ”I can tell you one thing--you aren't losing weight.” He had recovered from his annoyance, but he was not disposed to submit to any trifling. For many months now he had helped Darius to dress, when he came up from the shop for breakfast, and to undress in the evening. It was not that his father lacked the strength, but he would somehow lose himself in the maze of his garments, and apparently he could never remember the proper order of doffing or donning them. Sometimes he would ask, ”Am I dressing or undressing?” And he would be capable of so involving himself in a s.h.i.+rt, if Edwin were not there to direct, that much patience was needed for his extrication. His misapprehensions and mistakes frequently reached the grotesque. As habit threw them more and more intimately together, the trusting dependence of Darius on Edwin increased. At morning and evening the expression of that intensely mournful visage seemed to be saying as its gaze met Edwin's, ”Here is the one clear-sighted, powerful being who can guide me through this complex and frightful problem of my clothes.” A suit, for Darius, had become as intricate as a quadratic equation. And, in Edwin, compa.s.sion and irritation fought an interminable guerilla. Now one obtained the advantage, now the other. His nerves demanded relief from the friction, but he could offer them no holiday, not one single day's holiday. Twice every day he had to manoeuvre and persuade that ponderous, irrational body in his father's bedroom. Maggie helped the body to feed itself at table. But Maggie apparently had no nerves.

”I shall never go down them stairs again,” said Darius, as if in fatigued disgust, on the ottoman.

”Oh, nonsense!” Edwin exclaimed.

Darius shook his head solemnly, and looked at vacancy.

”Well, we'll talk about that to-morrow,” said Edwin, and with the skill of regular practice drew out the ends of the bow of his father's necktie. He had gradually evolved a complete code of rules covering the entire process of the toilette, and he insisted on their observance.

Every article had its order in the ceremony and its place in the room.

Never had the room been so tidy, nor the rites so expeditious, as in the final months of Darius's malady.

THREE.

The c.u.mbrous body lay in bed. The bed was in an architecturally contrived recess, sheltered from both the large window and the door.

Over its head was the gas-bracket and the bell-k.n.o.b. At one side was a night-table, and at the other a chair. In front of the night-table were Darius's slippers. On the chair were certain clothes. From a hook near the night-table, and almost over the slippers, hung his dressing-gown.

Seen from the bed, the dressing-table, at the window, appeared to be a long way off, and the wardrobe was a long way off in another direction.

The gas was turned low. It threw a pale illumination on the bed, and gleamed on a curve of mahogany here and there in the distances.

Edwin looked at his father, to be sure that all was in order, that nothing had been forgotten. The body seemed monstrous and shapeless beneath the thickly piled clothes; and from the edge of the eider-down, making a valley in the pillow, the bearded face projected, in a manner grotesque and ridiculous. A clock struck seven in another part of the house.

”What time's that?” Darius murmured.

”Seven,” said Edwin, standing close to him.

Darius raised himself slowly and clumsily on one elbow.

”Here! But look here!” Edwin protested. ”I've just fixed you up--”

The old man ignored him, and one of those unnaturally white hands stretched forth to the night-table, which was on the side of the bed opposite to Edwin. Darius's gold watch and chain lay on the night-table.

”I've wound it up! I've wound it up!” said Edwin, a little crossly.

”What are you worrying at?”

But Darius, silent, continued to manoeuvre his flannelled arm so as to possess the watch. At length he seized the chain, and, s.h.i.+fting his weight to the other elbow, held out the watch and chain to Edwin, with a most piteous expression. Edwin could see in the twilight that his father was ready to weep.

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