Part 44 (1/2)
”Don't move. After a little I can get Oliver to help you into bed.”
”I had a fall?”
His utterance was thick, his articulation indistinct, and he hiccoughed.
”Yes, sir. You are better, I think, and if you will only lie still a while you can soon be made comfortable in your own room.”
She went into the adjoining apartment, saw that the bed had been prepared, and a lamp lighted. When she returned he had struggled into a sitting posture, his arms clasped around his knees. She sat down and waited. On the table lay the brandy-stained telegram sent by Mr.
Herriott after he had burned the papers at Carville. She picked it up, read it twice, and laid it down.
”Mrs. Mitch.e.l.l, if you will help me I can get into a chair.”
She took his extended hands, and he rose slowly, staggered against her, and sank into his chair. Five minutes later he slept, but gradually his face resumed its usual color. Eliza brought a basin of water from the bedroom, washed away the brandy streaks from the floor and table, and with a silk handkerchief dried and polished the fine old mahogany, already whitening from its alcoholic bath. She went to an open window and waited. The night was balmy, and loitering, thievish puffs of air came laden with rifled sweetness from mult.i.tudinous lips of forest and garden bloom. Far away the m.u.f.fled monody of the river falls rose towards the stars, whose light wove a golden braid across the water's quivering crystal plunge over granite crags. In the dense shadow of the walnut grove a squirrel barked, and from their red cedar covert the game c.o.c.ks shrilled midnight.
After two hours Judge Kent awoke and groaned. Mrs. Mitch.e.l.l handed him a goblet of iced water, which he drained.
”Shall I go and rouse Oliver, or would you prefer Aaron to a.s.sist you?”
”I don't want either. If you will help me over this infernally slippery floor to my bedroom sofa, I can manage.”
”You do not wish the doctor sent for?”
”No.”
She took his arm, guided his unsteady steps to the sofa, arranged a pillow, and unlaced his shoes. Very soon his deep, regular breathing a.s.sured her the worst had pa.s.sed. Was it the brandy, or the telegram or both? What were the ”Ely Twiggs” papers, of which Eglah must know nothing, and why was she coming home immediately, instead of going to Sydney, or at least as far as Boston? Could Mr. Herriott have been a party to some scheme whereby she was entrapped into that sudden marriage?
At three o'clock she looked from the library door at the sleeping form on the sofa, and with anxiety allayed, went upstairs to her room.
Awaiting a cue, she made no inquiries when he appeared at late breakfast, and with characteristic aplomb his only reference to the previous evening was an apology for troubling her to give him a third cup of tea.
”My head is a trifle shaky from the jar of that fall. Men of my age and weight can not afford to sit down so heavily on bare boards, and I shall insist on matting when the carpets are taken up.”
The receipt of the telegram requesting him to meet his daughter in Philadelphia was followed by hurried preparations for departure, and Mrs. Mitch.e.l.l ventured to expostulate.
”Judge Kent, if you realized how serious was your attack in the library, you would not risk the imprudence of a railway journey. You ought to see your doctor. Let me go and meet Eglah in Philadelphia.”
His bloodshot eyes twinkled as they met hers.
”Doctor? Absurd! Attack? You mean that unlucky slip? It amounts to nothing except a stubborn stiffness on the side where I struck those diabolical sand-scoured boards. I particularly desire the matter should not be mentioned to my daughter, who would reproach herself severely for that 'dry-rubbed' floor she knows I detest as a cat does swimming.”
During his absence a cabinet maker was summoned and removed the ugly grey stains on Eglah's favorite piece of old claw-footed mahogany. For a time the incident seemed forgotten by all save the quiet, silent woman keeping watch for the consequences.
A few days after Eglah's return she sat at a window in her bedroom, noting the deepening glory of the west, where the sun was just sinking behind purple hills. It was the date on which the ”Ahvungah” would leave Sydney and begin her voyage to the world of eternal ice.
The day had seemed one of doom, as if set for a funeral, and the going down of the sun brought other shadows--darker than the mists that would soon swim under the stars. If Mr. Herriott had forgiven her she might have gone to Cape Breton, could have been with him till the last moment.
Now he was upon the ocean, and only G.o.d knew the future that looked so black, so spectral, so full of desolation.
Mrs. Mitch.e.l.l opened the door and handed her a package.
”Dearie, the express messenger brought this, and I signed for you.”
She went back to her own room and resumed her darning.