Part 5 (2/2)
He was in the act of rising--had risen, in fact, on one knee--when a spasm of pain took him, and his hand went up to his breast. For a moment he knelt so, turning on her a face of anguish; then sank and dropped in a heap at her feet.
Quick as thought she was down on her knees beside him, and, slipping an arm beneath his head, drew it upon her lap. While with swift fingers she loosened his collar and neckcloth, a peal of thunder rumbled out, and the first large raindrops fell splas.h.i.+ng on her hand. She recalled that last gesture of his, and with sudden inspiration searched in his breast-pocket, found and drew out a small phial, uncorked it, and forced the liquid between his teeth before they clenched in a second spasm. Two or three sharp flashes followed the first. In the glare of them her eyes searched along the river-bank, if haply help might be near; but all the anglers had departed. Rosewarne's face stared up at her, blue as a dead man's in the dazzling light. At first it seemed to twitch with each opening of the heavens; but this must have been a trick of eyesight, for his head lay quiet against her arm as she raised him a little, s.h.i.+elding him against the torrential rain which now hissed down, in ten seconds drenching her to the skin, blotting out river and meadow in a sheet of grey. It forced her to stoop her shoulders, and, so covering him, she put out a hand and laid it over his heart. Yes, it beat, though feebly. Once more she picked up the phial and gave him to drink, and in a little while he stirred feebly and found his voice.
”Rain? Is it rain?” he muttered.
”Yes; but I can spread my skirt over you. It will keep off a little.
Are you better?”
”Better? Yes, better. Let me feel the rain--it does me good.”
He lay silent for a minute or so. ”I shall be right again in a few minutes. Did you find the phial?”
”Yes.”
”Good girl. It was touch and go.” By and by he made a movement to sit up. ”Let us get home quickly. You can throw the rod into the river.
I shan't want it again.”
But she stood up, and, groping for the rod, drew the float ash.o.r.e, and untackled it, still in the hissing rain. The storm, after a brief lull, had redoubled its rage. The darkness opened and shut as with a rapidly moving slide, the white battlements of Caesar's Tower gleaming and vanis.h.i.+ng above the castle elms, and reappearing while their fierce candour yet blinded the eye. The thunder-peals, blending, wrapped Warwick as with one roar of artillery. Rosewarne had risen, and stood panting.
He grasped her shoulder. ”Come!” he commanded. The girl, dazzled by the lightning, puzzled by his sudden renewal of strength, turned and peered at him. He declined her arm. They walked back across the sodden meadow to the town, over the roofs of which, as the storm pa.s.sed away northward, the lightning yet glimmered at intervals, turning the gaslights to a dirty orange.
At the summit of the High Street, hard by the Leycester Hospital, they came to the doorway of a small shuttered shop, over which by the light of a street lamp one could read the legend, ”J. Marvin, Secondhand Bookseller.” The girl opened the door with a latchkey. An oil lamp burned in an office at the back of the shop--if that can be spoken of as a separate room which was, in fact, entirely walled off with books laid flat and rising in stacks from the floor. The place, in fact, suggested a cave or den rather than a shop, with stalagmites of piled literature and a subtle pervading odour of dust and decayed leather. The girl, after shutting the bolts behind her, led the way cautiously, and, crossing a pa.s.sage at the rear of the shop, opened a door upon a far more cheerful scene. Here, in a neat parlour hung with old prints and mezzotints and water-colours, a hanging lamp shed its rays on a China bowl heaped with Warwicks.h.i.+re roses, and on a white cloth and a table spread for supper.
”H'm!” grunted Rosewarne, glancing in through the doorway, while she lit a candle for him at the foot of the stairs. ”Your father and I used to sup in the kitchen, with old Selina to wait on us.”
”But since there is no longer any Selina! I had to pension her off, poor old soul, and she is gone to the almshouse.”
She handed him the light.
”Now, if you will go up to your room, I will fetch the hot water, and then you must give me your change of clothes. They shall be warmed for a few minutes at the kitchen fire, and you shall have them hot-and-hot.”
”It seems to me that while all this is doing, you will stand an excellent chance of rheumatic fever.”
”Oh, I shall be all right,” she announced cheerfully. ”No--don't look at me, please. I know very well that the dye has run out of these c.r.a.pes, and my face is beautifully streaked with black! Can you walk upstairs alone? Very well. And if you feel another attack coming, you are to call me at once.”
She must have been expeditious; for when he came downstairs again he found her awaiting him in the parlour, clad in a frock of duffel-grey, which, with her damp, closely plaited hair, gave her a Quakerish look. Yet the frock became her; the natural wave of her hair, defying moisture, showed here and there rebelliously, and her cheeks glowed after a vigorous towelling.
Rosewarne drew from under his coat a bottle of champagne, and set it on the table, where the lamp's ray fell full on its gold foil. Her eyes opened wide; for he had always visited this house in his oldest clothes and pa.s.sed for a poor man.
”Since you insist upon the parlour,” said he, ”I must try to live up to it.” He produced a knife from his pocket, with a pair of nippers, and began to cut the wire. ”Why are you wearing grey?” he demanded.
She flushed. ”This is my school frock. I have only one suit of mourning as yet.”
”And you sent away Selina. You wanted money, I suppose?”
”No,” she answered, after a moment, meeting his eyes frankly; ”at least, not in the way you mean. The doctor's bills were heavy, and for years father had done business enough to keep the roof over him and no more.
So at first there was--well, a pinch. The books will sell, of course; two honest men are already bidding for them--one at Birmingham and the other at Bristol. But meanwhile I must pinch a little or run in debt.
I hate debt.”
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