Part 35 (1/2)
”What am I to do?” Lizzie asked herself. ”She is sick and must be undressed. She is delirious. She must have fever. She ought to have a doctor, but who could I send at this time of night?”
She took Jane's wrist to test the pulse, but Jane s.n.a.t.c.hed it away.
”Oh, it's you, Liz!” she said, opening her eyes in a sort of inane, widening stare. ”You caught me, didn't you? Well, I want it this way.
When they look at me, if any of them comes, I want them to say old Jane was a sport from start to finish. The last dance is on. Mix the drinks, boys. Eat, drink, and shake the dice, for to-morrow you may not know where you are at, and n.o.body to pay the bill. But keep the other thing to yourselves. I don't want to hear about it. You say it was in the papers. I didn't see it. Liz didn't see it, either, and you say she and I are in the same box. Murder? Who says it was the same as murder? I didn't intend it. I'd never have let it happen if I could have prevented it. Yes, the baby was left with me, and--and I might have raised her different, but I was a sport, full of h.e.l.l and out for a good time! But, O G.o.d! I wonder what the little thing thought when the crash came. Gos.h.!.+
She must have screamed! She must have choked in that awful fire! Burned to a cinder! No flowers, no sod, no nothing! Well, what's the odds? Yes, I'll let Liz find out for herself. Somebody will tell her soon enough.
Lord! how a thing like that flies and spins through the air! It is everybody's business.”
”I want to undress you, Jane,” Lizzie said, bewildered by the ambiguous torrent of words. ”Let me unhook your frock.”
”No, fool, idiot, spitfire, cat!” Jane cried, angrily. ”I want to be like this--_just like this_. Get away! Leave me alone! How long will it take?--the Lord only knows. I couldn't ask the drug-clerk.”
”Well, I'll leave you, then,” Lizzie said, slightly offended.
Jane made no response, and Lizzie started to leave the room. She noticed the lamp and paused. ”She might get up and knock it over,” she thought, and, blowing her breath down the chimney, she extinguished the flame.
She was in her room, still undressed, when she heard the gate being opened. She went to the head of the stairs and listened. There was a vigorous rap. Lizzie went down the stairs and opened the door.
A man she knew to be Doctor Brackett stood on the porch, a satchel in his hand. His horse was at the gate.
”I'm just in from Atlanta,” he explained, hurriedly. ”I have a new clerk at my store, and in looking over his prescriptions I saw that he had sold Miss Holder quite a quant.i.ty of morphine tablets. You see, from the talk that is going on in town I was afraid she might have taken an--an overdose--you know what I mean?”
”I think something _is_ wrong with her,” Lizzie cried, aghast. ”Hurry!
Come! I'll light her lamp!”
Lizzie fairly ran up the steps and into Jane's room. She struck a match and lighted the lamp. The doctor followed her and bent over the sleeping woman. He opened her dress, quickly cut her corset-laces, and made an examination. Then, standing up, he turned to the bureau and began to search the littered top of it.
”Oh, here we are!” he exclaimed, in relief, as he picked up a vial containing morphine tablets and shook them between him and the light.
”She's had a close shave. She thought she was taking enough.”
”You mean that she--”
”Oh yes.” The doctor put the vial into his pocket. ”It is a plain case.
Her mind is out of order. She actually--so my clerk heard to-night--went to the undertaker's and asked him the prices of various costly caskets.
The undertaker thought she was referring to her recent bad news. She will come out of this sleep all right. But the truth is she can't recover. It is only a question of a week or two now. In fact, she won't get up from this. She hasn't the vitality. She has literally burned herself out and been living on her energies and nerves. She couldn't stand the shock of that sad calamity. I am sorry for you, too, Mrs.
Trott. John was a fine boy. Now leave her just as she is. She will be easier handled in the morning. She is in no immediate danger.”
The doctor took up his satchel and started away. In the darkened corridor Lizzie overtook him just as he had reached the head of the stairs.
”You said Jane had bad news, doctor,” she began, falteringly, dreading revelations to come. ”Do you mean about--about John taking her niece away?”
”Yes, Mrs. Trott, and the other--the deaths of the two in that awful wreck.”
”Death? Wreck?” Lizzie leaned breathlessly against the wall. ”What wreck--whose death?”
”Oh, oh, is it possible that you haven't heard?” And, standing in the slender shaft of light from Jane's partly closed door, the doctor awkwardly explained. Lizzie listened, as he thought, calmly enough. He couldn't read her face, for she kept it averted in the shadow.