A Woman Named Smith Page 20

  CHAPTER XIX

  DEEP WATERS

  Somewhere, far, far off, a faint and feeble little light glimmered,one small point of light in vast blackness. In the whole universethere wasn't anything or anybody but just that tiny light, and swiftblack water, and drowning me. Something deep within me--I thinkoccultists call it the body-spirit--was clamoring frantically tohold fast to the light, because if that went under I should gounder, too. I tried to keep my eyes upon the trembling spark.

  Whereupon the light changed to a sound, the monotonous insistence ofwhich forced me to be worriedly aware of it. It was--why, it was avoice, calling, over and over and over again, "_Sophy! Sophy!_"

  Somebody was calling _me_. With an immense effort I managed to raisemy eyelids. I was lying in a bed, and caught a drowsy, fleetingglimpse of four posts.

  Four posts upon my bed, Four angels for my head, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John Bless the bed that I lie on!

  Granny used to say that for me at night; only she had said "fourhangels for my 'ead," at which I used to giggle into my pillows. Ihadn't felt so close to Granny since I was little Sophy, in therooms over our shop in Boston. She was somewhere around me; if Iwent to sleep now, she'd be there when I woke up in the morning. Butthe sound that was a calling voice wouldn't let me go to sleep.Slowly, heavily, I managed to get my eyes open again.

  "Look at me!" said the voice imperiously. Two large dark eyes caughtmy wavering glance and held it, as in a vise. "Sophy! Sophy! _I needyou._"

  Said another voice, then, brokenly: "For mercy's sake, Jelnik, lether go in peace!"

  "No, she sha'n't die. I won't have it!--Sophy, come back! It is Iwho call you, Sophy. Come back!"

  My stiff lips moved. "Must go--sleep," I tried to say.

  "No, I forbid you to go to sleep, Sophy!" His dark eyes, full oflife and compelling power, held my tired and dimmed ones, his firm,warm hands held my cold and inert fingers. "My love, my dear love,stay. You have got to stay, Sophy. Don't you understand? You can'tgo, Sophy!"

  My dulled brain stumblingly laid hold upon a thought: _NicholasJelnik was calling me. He was calling me because he loved me._ Onesimply can't go down into sleep and darkness, when a miracle likethat is climbing like the morning-star into one's skies.

  "Stay!" he said, his lips against my ear. "Sophy! My love, my dearlove, stay!"

  But although he held me close, I could feel myself being drawn away.There must have been that in my straining glance that made himaware, for of a sudden he cried out, lifted me bodily in his arms,and kissed me on the mouth.

  My heart quite stopped beating, as a spent runner pauses, that hemay gather new strength to go on. With a sigh I fell back; but notinto the water and the dark.

  "By God, you've pulled her through, Jelnik!" cried the voice ofRichard Geddes.

  Came vague sounds, stirs, movements, hands upon me. Then oblivionagain.

  I woke up one pleasant forenoon to find a brisk and capable youngwoman in white sitting in my room, her head bent over the piece oflinen she was hemming. She was a healthy, handsome young woman, withhard, firm cheeks, hard, firm lips, and professional eyes andglasses. She glanced up and met my wan stare.

  "What are you doing here, if you please?" I asked politely.

  "I have been nursing you, Miss Smith. You have been quite ill, youknow."

  I lay there looking at that self-contained, trained young woman,with feelings of almost ludicrous astonishment. I remembered theskidding car; and Richard Geddes lying with his head on Alicia'sknees, and how we had both thought him dead; and myself sitting inthe dust; and then the pain. But it was astounding news that I hadbeen very badly hurt full three weeks ago!

  Alicia stole in and, seeing me awake, tried to smile, but criedinstead, with a wet cheek against my hand. A few minutes laterDoctor Geddes himself appeared. It was enough to scandalize anyself-contained nurse to see a six-foot-three doctor behave in themost abandoned and unbedside manner!

  "Sophy!" gulped the doctor, "oh, deuce take you, Sophronisba Two,what do you mean by scaring honest folks half out of their wits?"

  The nurse was destined to receive another shock. Richard of the LionHeart dropped down on his knees beside Alicia, and laid his beardedcheek against my wan one, and for a while couldn't speak. Aliciatried to get her slender arms around him, and couldn't.

  "I think," ventured the nurse, in level tones, "that the patienthad better not be excited. Shall I give her a stimulant, doctor?"

  "The patient's on the highroad to getting well," said the doctor."And we're the best of all stimulants, aren't we, Sophy?"

  When I began to get stronger, the dream which had haunted my illnesscame back with astonishing vividness and haunted my waking hours. Iknew it was a dream, for of course I hadn't been in black water, Ihadn't strained toward a light upon the flood, and of course, Ihadn't really heard Nicholas Jelnik calling my name; and the kisswas part of the fantasy. I watched him stealthily, this cool,collected, impersonal young man, to whom even the efficient nursewas astonishingly respectful, and pure laughter seized me at theidea of _his_ crying aloud, being as agitated, as passionate, asfiercely insistent, as he had been in the vision.

  I ventured to put a part of the vagary to the acid test:

  "Alicia, I wasn't thrown out again, into water, was I?"

  "No. That was delirium, dear. You were frightfully ill for a while,Sophy." Her face paled. "So ill that The Author fled, because hewouldn't stay in the house and see--what we expected to see. He saidit would permanently shatter his nerves. But he has wired every daysince."

  "It was sensible of him to go. And it's kind of him to wire." I saidno more about the water.

  "Everybody has been kind. And it wasn't duty kindness, either. Itwas kind kindness!" said Alicia, lucidly. "Do you know what they'resaying in Hyndsville now? They're saying old Sophronisba played ajoke on herself." She left me to digest that as best I might.

  It isn't pleasant to be ill anywhere. But it isn't altogetherunpleasant to be on the sick list in South Carolina. Everybody isanxious about you. Old ladies with palm-leaf fans in their tirelesshands come and sit with you. They aren't brilliant old ladies, youunderstand. I know some whose secular library consists of theComplete Works of John Esten Cooke, Gilmore Simms's War Poems of theSouth, and a thumbed copy of Father Ryan. But add to these theBible, the Book of Common Prayer, and the Imitation of Christ, andit doesn't make such a bad showing. It's astonishing how soothingthe companionship of women fed upon this pabulum can be, when thethings of the world are of necessity set aside for a space, and thesimpler things of the spirit draw near.

  Old gentlemen in well-brushed clothes and immaculate, exquisitelydarned linen, call daily with small gifts of fruit and flowers, andsend you messages from which you infer that the sun won't be able toshine properly until you come outside again. And there isn't ahousekeeper of your acquaintance who hasn't got you on her mind:there are sent to you steaming bowls of perfect soup, flaky rollsand golden cake, jeweled jellies, and cool, enticing, trembly thingsin glass dishes. And when you can sit up for more than an hour ortwo at a time, why, then you know what it really means to have SouthCarolina neighbors.

  Doctor Geddes made me spend my days in the garden that Schmetz hadlabored upon with such loving-kindness, and that in consequence wasbecome a marvel of bloom and scent. Every butterfly in SouthCarolina must have visited that garden. I hadn't known there werethat many butterflies in the world. All the florist-shop windows inNew York, that I had once paused before with envy and longing, werestinted and poor and pale before the living, out-o'-doors wonder ofit. Florist shops haven't any bees, nor birds, nor butterflies, nortrees that wave their green branches at you like friendly hands.

  A flowering vine festooned the marble Love, and one great scarletspray of bloom flamed upon his marble torch, "so lyrically," MissMartha Hopkins said, that she was moved to write a poem about it. Ithought it a very nice poem, and I said so, when she read it to us.But Doctor Geddes, who doesn't care
for poetry, except RobertBurns's, rubbed his nose.

  "Oh, well, your grandmother and your aunts used to makeantimacassars and wall-pockets and paper flowers," he ruminated."Why shouldn't you make poetry if you feel like it?"

  "You are to be pitied, Richard," said Miss Martha, with crushingcharity. "Such a disposition! And the older you grow the worse itgets."

  "Confound it, Martha!--"

  "I do," said she.

  Alicia looked at Richard with impersonal eyes. She looked at theruffled center of culture.

  "Don't pay any attention to him, Miss Martha," she said, with acharming smile. "Your poem is very pretty, and he knows it."

  "He means well," said Miss Martha, resignedly.

  "Now, you look here, Martha!" the doctor said angrily, "I won't haveanybody telling me to my face I mean well. You might as well call mea fool outright."

  "You are far from being a fool, Richard. And you do mean well.Everybody knows that."

  He turned appealingly to his dear Leetchy, and received his firstlesson in Domestic Science.

  "Miss Martha is right, Richard," she decided.

  "Leetchy," the doctor asked, when the mollified Miss Hopkins haddeparted, "why did Martha go off grinning?"

  "How should I know?" wondered Alicia, innocently. Then she looked athim with Irish eyes: "Have you had your lunch, dear?" she asked.

  "Lunch?" He looked bewildered.

  "Because I'm going to fix Sophy's lunch now, and you may have yourswith her, if you like. I love to wait on you, Richard," she added,and a beautiful color flooded her face.

  He caught his breath. When she went back to the house, his eyesfollowed her adoringly.

  "Sophy," he said, huskily, "what does she see in me? Do you thinkI'm good enough for _her_, Sophy?"

  "I think you are quite good enough even for Alicia."

  When he had gone, Alicia sat with her head against my knees. Of latea touching gravity, a sweet seriousness, had settled upon her. Herlove for the big doctor was singularly clear-eyed and far-seeing.There were going to be times when every ounce of skill, tact,patience, love itself, would be called upon, for the reins must begossamer-light, invisible, but always firm and sure, that shouldguide and tone down so impatient and fiery a nature as his. It wasvery easy to love him; it wasn't always going to be easy to livewith him, and Alicia knew it. But she also knew, with a faith beyondall failing, that this was her high, destined, heaven-ordained job.

  "Sophy darlin', I'm deplorably young, am I not?" she sighed.

  "You'll get over it."

  "Do you think I'll make him a good wife, Sophy?"

  "I am absolutely certain," I said, "that you'll make him a goodhusband. Which is far more important."

  Alicia hugged my knees, and laughed. Then, seeing Mr. NicholasJelnik approaching, she scrambled to her feet, picked up the tray ofempty dishes, and went back to the house.

  Neither she nor the doctor had asked me so much as one questionabout Mr. Jelnik. As if by tacit understanding that subject wasavoided. And because I hadn't anything to tell them, I, too, held mypeace.

  He raised my hand to his lips, dropped into a chair, and bared hisforehead to the soft wind.

  "How good that feels!" he sighed. "Fraeulein, may one smoke?" Andreceiving permission he smoked for a while, comfortably, leaningback with half-closed eyes.

  "Achmet salaams to you, _hanoum_," he said presently. "You have wonhis heart of a true believer. Even Daoud demands daily news of you."

  "I particularly like The Jinnee. I should like to have him aroundme. And Daoud is highly ornamental."

  "When is The Author coming back? Or is he coming back?" he askedabruptly.

  "Oh, yes. He will be here for the wedding. So will Miss Emmeline."

  After a long pause, and with an evident effort:

  "I have been thinking," he said, "that perhaps it was unfortunate Icame between you and The Author. Perhaps," he added deliberately,"it would have been better had you let your common sense gain theday."

  I don't know why, but just at that moment the dear and hauntingdream of having been lifted out of deep waters and kissed back tolife, cradled in this man's arms, came to me with peculiarpoignancy. Of a sudden I laughed aloud.

  "Oh, I'm just remembering a dream I had, when I was ill," I toldhim, in answer to his look of surprise.

  "It must have been a very amusing dream," said he, staring at methoughtfully.

  "Oh, very! Quite absurd. But go on. You were by way of advising meto marry The Author, were you not?"

  His hands on the arms of the wicker chair clenched. He half rose,thought better of it, and sank back.

  "I was saying that it might have been better for you," he said,breathing quickly. "In all probability you would have accepted him,had I not been here to--blunder into the affair."

  "He mightn't have asked me, if you hadn't been here to blunder intothe affair," said I, composedly. "Let us drop the subject, please. Ishall never marry The Author." It gave me a sense of relief andfreedom to hear myself say that. "I can't marry The Author."

  He went pale. "Sophy--you can't marry me, either," he said.

  "Of course not." I wondered at myself for being so calm andcollected. "I knew that all along. You care for another woman. Youtold me so, you know."

  "I told you no such thing," he said. "I told you I cared for awoman, but that there was another man. Now I've just been told shehas no idea of accepting the other man. In spite of all he has tooffer, she isn't going to marry him." His face was at once ecstaticand tortured. "_Why_ won't you marry the other man, Sophy?"

  "Because of a dream I dreamed, when I was sick," I saidnoncommittally.

  "Ah! And did you dream that somebody called you--and held you--andwouldn't let you go?"

  "I never told you!" I cried.

  "No need, Sophy. It was to me you came back." Of a sudden his headdrooped. "And now I can't marry you!"

  "Why can't you?"

  "Because I'm a beggar."

  Nicholas Jelnik a beggar couldn't find lodgment in my brain. I couldonly stare at him incredulously.

  "I learned some time ago that things were not altogether right overyonder, but I hadn't the ghost of an idea that my entire estate wasinvolved; that while I'd been 'tramping'--I'll use Judge Gatchell'sword--the men in whose hands I placed too much power had takenadvantage of it. A very common, every-day story, you see.

  "Remains the fact that I'm stripped to the bone. The estate's wipedout. And," he added, with a grave smile, "I haven't even discoveredthe mythical Hynds jewels. Now you see, Sophy, why I can't marryyou."

  "I see why you think you can't."

  He flushed to the roots of his black hair. Hynds-Jelnik pride rosein arms.

  "I should cut rather a sorry figure marrying the owner of HyndsHouse, in the present circumstances," he said curtly. "You willremember that The Author called me an adventurer! I have told you Ihave nothing."

  "Aren't you forgetting your profession?"

  "No. But I neglected that, too, Sophy. The _Wanderlust_ had me inits grip."

  "What do you propose to do?"

  "I shall leave here, put in some months of hard study, and thenfight my way upward. My father was the greatest alienist of hisgeneration, and I was trained under his eye. But in the meantime--"

  "Yes. In the meantime, what of _me_?" I asked.

  He winced as if he had been struck. "You are free," he said, in awhisper.

  "I am free to be free, and you're free to set me free. You neverasked me to marry you, in the first place," I agreed quietly.

  Stupefaction seized him. He put his hands to his head.

  "Why, Sophy! Why, Sophy!" he stammered. Of a sudden he straightenedhis shoulders, and stood erect: "Miss Smith," he said, with gravepoliteness, "will you do me the honor to marry me?" and he waited.

  "It is rather a belated request, Mr. Jelnik. Besides, you haven'ttold me why you want to marry me," said I, sedately.

  "You are well aware that I love you, Sophy. And I think you ca
re forme in return. Why did you turn that coin when it meant 'Go,' and bidme, instead, 'Stay'? Was it because you cared, Sophy?"

  "Yes, Mr. Jelnik: it was because I cared. I cared enough to tella--a lie. And--I shall say yes to your other question, Mr. Jelnik."

  But he shook his head. "Ah, no, my dear! You'd be called upon tomake too many sacrifices. I couldn't bear that!"

  "A man needn't be worried about the sacrifices a woman makes for himwhen she knows he loves her."

  "Not in normal circumstances; not when he can give as much as hetakes."

  "Hynds House," I said, "is costing me a steep and bitter price, Mr.Jelnik!"

  "Do I not also pay?" he asked fiercely.

  "Oh, you have your pride!" said I, wearily; "Hynds pride!"

  "A poor enough possession, Sophy, but all that remains to me," hesaid gently. "Is it a light thing for Nicholas Jelnik to say to thewoman he loves, 'I cannot marry you: I am a beggar'? Is it such asmall sacrifice to give you up, Sophy?"

  "It would appear so."

  "You crucify me!" he said, in a choking voice. "Good God, don't youunderstand that I love you?"

  "I don't understand anything, except that you are going away fromme. And I have waited for you all my life," I said.

  "And I for you! and I for you!" he said passionately. "Don't make ittoo hard for me, Sophy!"

  "If you go away from me," I gasped, "I think I shall die.Nicholas--I can't bear it! It was easier for me when I thought youloved somebody else. But now that I know you love _me_" and Ipaused.

  He took a step forward, but stopped. His arms fell to his sides.

  "Not as a beggar!" he said. "Not as a beggar! Never that, forNicholas Jelnik! I love you too much for that, Sophy. I love you notonly for yourself, but for my own best self, too, my dearest."

  For a moment he stood there, regarding me fixedly. It was a longlook, of suffering, of love, of pride, of unyielding resolve. Thenhe lifted my hand to his lips, bowed, and left me.

  I sat staring over the garden. I wondered if, somewhere on the otherside of things, Great-Aunt Sophronisba wasn't snickering.