23. The Master-of-the-House was coming! You could feel the quiver of excitement in the air of the place. The boatmen were polishing the brasses of the launch; the yard-man was raking up the dry strips of palm from beneath the cocoanut trees; Aunt Varina was ordering new supplies, and entering into conspiracies with the cook. The nurses asked me timidly, what was He like, and even Dr. Gibson, a testy old gentleman who had clashed violently with me on the subject of woman’s suffrage, and had avoided me ever since as a suspicious character, now came and confided his troubles. He had sent home for a trunk, and the graceless express companies had sent it astray. Now he was wondering if it was necessary for him to journey to Key West and have a suit of dinner clothes made over night. I told him that I had not sent for any party-dresses, and that I expected to meet Mr. Douglas van Tuiver at his dinner-table in plain white linen. His surprise was so great that I suspected the old gentleman of having wondered whether I meant to retire to a “second-table” when the Master-of-the-House arrived.
I went away by myself, seething with wrath. Who was this great one whom we honoured? Was he an inspired poet, a maker of laws, a discoverer of truth? He was the owner of an indefinite number of millions of dollars—that was all, and yet I was expected, because of my awe of him, to abandon the cherished convictions of my lifetime. The situation was one that challenged my fighting blood. This was the hour to prove whether I really meant the things I talked.
On the morning of the day that van Tuiver was expected, I went early to Aunt Varina’s room. She was going in the launch, and was in a state of flustration, occupied in putting on her best false hair. “Mrs. Tuis,” I said, “I want you to let me go to meet Mr. van Tuiver instead of you.”
I will not stop to report the good lady’s outcries. I did not care, I said, whether it was proper, nor did I care whether, as she finally hinted, it might not be agreeable to Mr. van Tuiver. I was sorry to have to thrust myself upon him, but I was determined to go, and would let nothing prevent me. And all at once she yielded, rather surprising me by the suddenness of it. I suppose she concluded that van Tuiver was the man to handle me, and the quicker he got at it the better.
It is a trying thing to deal with the rich and great. If you treat them as the rest of the world does, you are a tuft-hunter; if you treat them as the rest of the world pretends to, you are a hypocrite; whereas, if you deal with them truly, it is hard not to seem, even to yourself, a bumptious person. I remember trying to tell myself on the launch-trip that I was not in the least excited; and then, standing on the platform of the railroad station, saying: “How can you expect not to be excited, when even the railroad is excited?”
“Will Mr. van Tuiver’s train be on time?” I asked, of the agent.
“‘Specials’ are not often delayed,” he replied, “at least, not Mr. van Tuiver’s.”
The engine and its two cars drew up, and the traveller stepped out upon the platform, followed by his secretary and his valet. I went forward to meet him. “Good morning, Mr. van Tuiver.”
I saw at once that he did not remember me. “Mrs. Abbott,” I prompted. “I came to meet you.”
“Ah,” he said. He had never got clear whether I was a sewing-woman, or a tutor, or what, and whenever he erred in such matters, it was on the side of caution.
“Your wife is doing well,” I said, “and the child as well as could be expected.”
“Thank you,” he said. “Did no one else come?”
“Mrs. Tuis was not able,” I said, diplomatically, and we moved towards the launch.
24. He did not offer to help me into the vessel, but I, crude Western woman, did not miss the attention. We seated ourselves in the upholstered leather seats in the stern, and when the “luggage” had been stowed aboard, the little vessel swung away from the pier. Then I said: “If you will pardon me, Mr. van Tuiver, I should like to talk with you privately.”
He looked at me for a moment, and then answered, abruptly: “Yes, madam.” The secretary rose and went forward.
The whirr of the machinery and the strong breeze made by the boat’s motion, made it certain that no one could hear us, and so I began my attack: “Mr. van Tuiver, I am a friend of your wife’s. I came here to help her in this crisis, and I came to-day to meet you because it was necessary for someone to talk to you frankly about the situation. You will understand, I presume, that Mrs. Tuis is not—not very well informed about the matters in question.”
His gaze was fixed intently upon me, but he said not a word. After waiting, I continued: “Perhaps you will wonder why your wife’s physicians could not have handled the matter. The reason is, there is a woman’s side to such questions and often it is difficult for men to understand it. If Sylvia knew the truth, she could speak for herself; so long as she does not know it, I shall have to take the liberty of speaking for her.”
Again there was a pause. He did nothing more than watch me, yet I could feel his affronted maleness rising up for battle. I waited on purpose to compel him to speak.
“May I ask,” he inquired, at last, “what you mean by the ‘truth’ that you refer to?”
“I mean,” I said, “the cause of the infant’s affliction.”
His composure was a thing to wonder at. He did not show by the flicker of an eyelash any sign of uneasiness.
“Let me explain one thing,” I continued. “I owe it to Dr. Perrin to make clear that he had nothing whatever to do with my coming into possession of the secret. In fact, as he will no doubt tell you, I knew it before he did; it is possible that you owe it to me that the infant is not disfigured as well as blind.”
I paused again. “If that be true,” he said, with unshaken formality, “I am obliged to you.” What a man!
I continued: “My one desire and purpose is to protect my friend. So far, the secret has been kept from her. I consented to this, because her very life was at stake, it seemed to us all. But now she is well enough to know, and the question is SHALL she know. I need hardly tell you that Dr. Perrin thinks she should not, and that he has been using his influence to persuade me to agree with him; so also has Mrs. Tuis——”
Then I saw the first trace of uncertainty in his eyes. “There was a critical time,” I explained, “when Mrs. Tuis had to be told. You may be sure, however, that no hint of the truth will be given by her. I am the only person who is troubled with the problem of Sylvia’s rights.”
I waited. “May I suggest, Mrs.—Mrs. Abbott—that the protection of Mrs. van Tuiver’s rights can be safely left to her physicians and her husband?”
“One would wish so, Mr. van Tuiver, but the medical books are full of evidence that women’s rights frequently need other protection.”
I perceived that he was nearing the end of his patience now. “You make it difficult for me to talk to you,” he said. “I am not accustomed to having my affairs taken out of my hands by strangers.”
“Mr. van Tuiver,” I replied, “in this most critical matter it is necessary to speak without evasion. Before her marriage Sylvia made an attempt to safeguard herself in this very matter, and she was not dealt with fairly.”
At last I had made a hole in the mask! His face was crimson as he replied: “Madam, your knowledge of my private affairs is most astonishing. May I inquire how you learned these things?”
I did not reply at once, and he repeated the question. I perceived that this was to him the most important matter—his wife’s lack of reserve!
“The problem that concerns us here,” I said, “is whether you are willing to repair the error you made. Will you go frankly to your wife and admit your responsibility——”
He broke in, angrily: “Madam, the assumption you are making is one I see no reason for permitting.”
“Mr. van Tuiver,” said I, “I hoped that you would not take that line of argument. I perceive that I have beennaive.”
“Really, madam!” he replied, with cruel intent, “you have not impressed me so!”
I continued unshaken: “In this conversation it will be necessary to assume that you are responsible for the presence of the disease.”
“In that case,” he replied, haughtily, “I can have no further part in the conversation, and I will ask you to drop it at once.”
I might have taken him at his word and waited, confident that in the end he would have to come and ask for terms. But that would have seemed childish to me, with the grave matters we had to settle. After a minute or two, I said, quietly: “Mr. van Tuiver, you wish me to believe that previous to your marriage you had always lived a chaste life?”
He was equal to the effort it cost to control himself. He sat examining me with his cold grey eyes. I suppose I must have been as new and monstrous a phenomenon to him as he was to me.
At last, seeing that he would not reply, I said, coldly: “It will help us to get forward if you will give up the idea that it is possible for you to put me off, or to escape this situation.”
“Madam,” he cried, suddenly, “come to the point! What is it that you want? Money?”
I had thought I was prepared for everything; but this was an aspect of his world which I could hardly have been expected to allow for. I stared at him and then turned from the sight of him. “And to think that Sylvia is married to such a man!” I whispered, half to myself.
“Mrs. Abbott,” he exclaimed, “how can anyone understand what you are driving at?”
But I turned away without answering, and for a long time sat gazing over the water. What was the use of pleading with such a man? What was the use of pouring out one’s soul to him? I would tell Sylvia the truth at once, and leave him to her!
25. I heard him again, at last; he was talking to my back, his tone a trifle less aloof. “Mrs. Abbott, do you realize that I know nothing whatever about you—your character, your purpose, the nature of your hold upon my wife? So what means have I of judging? You threaten me with something that seems to me entirely insane—and what can I make of it? If you wish me to understand you, tell me in plain words what you want.”
I reflected that I was in the world, and must take it as I found it. “I have told you what I want,” I said; “but I will tell you again, if it is necessary. I hoped to persuade you that it was your duty to go to your wife and tell her the truth.”
He took a few moments to make sure of his self-possession. “And would you explain what good you imagine that could do?”
“Your wife,” I said, “must be put in position to protect herself in future. There is no means of making sure in such a matter, except to tell her the truth. You love her—and you are a man who has never been accustomed to do without what he wants.”
“Great God, woman!” he cried. “Don’t you suppose one blind child is enough?”
It was the first human word that he had spoken, and I was grateful for it. “I have already covered that point,” I said, in a low voice. “The medical books are full of painful evidence that several blind children are often not enough. There can be no escaping the necessity—Sylvia mustknow.The only question is, who shall tell her? You must realize that in urging you to be the person, I am thinking of your good as well as hers. I will, of course, not mention that I have had anything to do with persuading you, and so it will seem to her that you have some realization of the wrong you have done her, some desire to atone for it, and to be honourable and fair in your future dealings with her. When she has once been made to realize that you are no more guilty than other men of your class—hat you have done no worse than all of them——
“You imagine she could be made to believe that?” he broke in, impatiently.
“I will undertake to see that she believes it,” I replied.
“You seem to have great confidence in your ability to manage my wife!”
“If you continue to resent my existence,” I answered, gravely, “you will make it impossible for me to help you.”
“Pardon me,” he said—but he did not say it cordially.
I went on: “There is much that can be said in your behalf. I realize it is quite possible that you were not wholly to blame when you wrote to Bishop Chilton that you were fit to marry; I know that you may have believed it—that you might even have found physicians to tell you so. There is wide-spread ignorance on the subject of this disease. Men have the idea that the chronic forms of it cannot be communicated to women, and it is difficult to make them realize what modern investigations have proven. You can explain that to Sylvia, and I will back you up in it. You were in love with her, you wanted her. Go to her now, and admit to her honestly that you have wronged her. Beg her to forgive you, and to let you help make the best of the cruel situation that has arisen.”
So I went on, pouring out my soul. And when I had finished, he said, “Mrs. Abbott, I have listened patiently to your most remarkable proposition. My answer is that I must ask you to withdraw from this intimate matter, which concerns only my wife and myself.”
He was back where we started! Trying to sweep aside these grim and terrible realities with the wave of a conventional hand! Was this the way he met Sylvia’s arguments? I felt moved to tell him what I thought of him.
“You are a proud man, Mr. van Tuiver—an obstinate man, I fear. It is hard for you to humble yourself to your wife—to admit a crime and beg forgiveness. Tell me—is that why you hesitate? Is it because you fear you will have to take second place in your family from now on—that you will no longer be able to dominate Sylvia? Are you afraid of putting into her hands a weapon of self-defence?”
He made no response.
“Very well,” I said, at last. “Let me tell you, then—I will not help any man to hold such a position in a woman’s life. Women have to bear half the burdens of marriage, they pay half, or more than half, the penalties; and so it is necessary that they have a voice in its affairs. Until they know the truth, they can never have a voice.”
Of course my little lecture on Feminism might as well have been delivered to a sphinx. “How stupid you are!” I cried. “Don’t you know that some day Sylvia must find out the truth for herself?”
This was before the days when newspapers and magazines began to discuss such matters frankly; but still there were hints to be picked up. I had a newspaper-item in my bag—the board of health in a certain city had issued a circular giving instructions for the prevention of blindness in newly-born infants, and discussing the causes thereof; and the United States post office authorities had barred the circular from the mails. I said, “Suppose that item had come under Sylvia’s eyes; might it not have put her on the track. It was in her newspaper the day before yesterday; and it was only by accident that I got hold of it first. Do you suppose that can go on forever?”
“Now that I am here,” he replied, “I will be glad to relieve you of such responsibilities.”
Which naturally made me cross. I drew from my quiver an arrow that I thought would penetrate his skin. “Mr. van Tuiver,” I said, “a man in your position must always be an object of gossip and scandal. Suppose some enemy were to send your wife an anonymous letter? Or suppose there were some woman who thought that you had wronged her?”
I stopped. He gave me one keen look—and then again the impenetrable mask! “My wife will have to do as other women in her position do—pay no attention to scandal-mongers of any sort.”
I paused, and then went on: “I believe in marriage. I consider it a sacred thing; I would do anything in my power to protect and preserve a marriage. But I hold that it must be an equal partnership. I would fight to make it that; and wherever I found that it could not be that, I would say it was not marriage, but slavery, and I would fight just as hard to break it. Can you not understand that attitude upon a woman’s part?”
He gave no sign that he could understand. But still I would not give up my battle. “Mr. van Tuiver,” I pleaded, “I am a much older person than you. I have seen a great deal of life—I have seen suffering even worse than yours. And I am trying most earnestly to help you. Can you not bring yourself to talk to me frankly? Perhaps you have never talked with a woman about such matters—I mean, with a good woman. But I assure you that other men have found it possible, and never regretted the confidence they placed in me.”
I went on to tell him about my own sons, and what I had done for them; I told him of a score of other boys in their class who had come to me, making me a sort of mother-confessor. I do not think that I was entirely deceived by my own eloquence—there was, I am sure, a minute or two when he actually wavered. But then the habits of a precocious life-time reasserted themselves, and he set his lips and told himself that he was Douglas van Tuiver. Such things might happen in raw Western colleges, but they were not according to the Harvard manner, nor the tradition of life in Fifth Avenue clubs.
He could not be a boy! He had never had any boyhood, any childhood—he had been a state personage ever since he had known that he was anything. I found myself thinking suddenly of the thin-lipped old family lawyer, who had had much to do with shaping his character, and whom Sylvia described to me, sitting at her dinner-table and bewailing the folly of people who “admitted things.” That was what made trouble for family lawyers—not what people did, but what they admitted. How easy it was to ignore impertinent questions! And how few people had the wit to do it!-it seemed as if the shade of the thin-lipped old family lawyer were standing by Douglas van Tuiver’s side.
In a last desperate effort, I cried, “Even suppose that I grant your request, even suppose I agree not to tell Sylvia the truth—still the day will come when you will hear from her the point-blank question: ‘Is my child blind because of this disease?’ And what will you answer?”
He said, in his cold, measured tones, “I will answer that there are a thousand ways in which the disease can be innocently acquired.”
For a long time there was silence between us. At last he spoke again, and his voice was as emotionless as if we had just met: “Do I understand you, madam, that if I reject your advice and refuse to tell my wife what you call the truth, it is your intention to tell her yourself?”
“You understand me correctly,” I replied.
“And may I ask when you intend to carry out this threat?”
“I will wait,” I said, “I will give you every chance to think it over—to consult with the doctors, in case you wish to. I will not take the step without giving you fair notice.”
“For that I am obliged to you,” he said, with a touch of irony; and that was our last word.
26. Our island was visible in the distance and I was impatient for the time when I should be free from this man’s presence. But as we drew nearer, I noticed a boat coming out; it proved to be one of the smaller launches heading directly for us. Neither van Tuiver nor I spoke, but both of us watched it, and he must have been wondering, as I was, what its purpose could be. When it was near enough, I made out that its passengers were Dr. Perrin and Dr. Gibson.
We slowed up, and the other boat did the same, and they lay within a few feet of each other. Dr. Perrin greeted van Tuiver, and after introducing the other man, he said: “We came out to have a talk with you. Would you be so good as to step into this boat?”
“Certainly,” was the reply. The two launches were drawn side by side, and the transfer made; the man who was running the smaller launch stepped into ours—evidently having been instructed in advance.
“You will excuse us please?” said the little doctor to me. The man who had stepped into our launch spoke to the captain of it, and the power was then put on, and we moved away a sufficient distance to be out of hearing. I thought this a strange procedure, but I conjectured that the doctors had become nervous as to what I might have told van Tuiver. So I dismissed the matter from my mind, and spent my time reviewing the exciting adventure I had just passed through.
How much impression had I made? It was hard for me to judge such a man. He would pretend to be less concerned than he actually was. But surely he must see that he was in my power, and would have to give way in the end!
There came a hail from the little vessel, and we moved alongside again. “Would you kindly step in here with us, Mrs. Abbott?” said Dr. Perrin, and when I had done so, he ordered the boatman to move away once more. Van Tuiver said not a word, but I noted a strained look upon his face, and I thought the others seemed agitated also.
As soon as the other vessel was out of hearing, Dr. Perrin turned to me and said: “Mrs. Abbott, we came out to see Mr. van Tuiver, to warn him of a distressing accident which has just happened. Mrs. van Tuiver was asleep in her room, and Miss Lyman and another of the nurses were in the next room. They indiscreetly made some remarks on the subject which we have all been discussing—how much a wife should be told about these matters, and suddenly they discovered Mrs. van Tuiver standing in the doorway of the room.”
My gaze had turned to Douglas van Tuiver. “So sheknows!” I cried.
“We don’t think that she knows, but she has a suspicion and is trying to find out. She asked to see you.”
“Ah, yes!” I said.
“She declared that she wished to see you as soon as you returned—that she would not see anyone else, not even Mr. van Tuiver. You will understand that this portends trouble for all of us. We judged it necessary to have a consultation about the matter.”
I bowed in assent.
“Now, Mrs. Abbot,” began the little doctor, solemnly, “there is no longer a question of abstract ideas, but of an immediate emergency. We feel that we, as the physicians in charge of the case, have the right to take control of the matter. We do not see——”
“Dr. Perrin,” I said, “let us come to the point. You want me to spin a new web of deception?”
“We are of the opinion, Mrs. Abbott, that in such matters the physicians in charge——”
“Excuse me,” I said, quickly, “we have been over all this before, and we know that we disagree. Has Mr. van Tuiver told you of the proposition I have just made?”
“You mean for him to go to his wife——”
“Yes.”
“He has told us of this, and has offered to do it. We are of the opinion that it would be a grave mistake.”
“It has been three weeks since the birth of the baby,” I said. “Surely all danger of fever is past. I will grant you that if it were a question of telling her deliberately, it might be better to put it off for a while. I would have been willing to wait for months, but for the fact that I dreaded something like the present situation. Now that it has happened, surely it is best to use our opportunity while all of us are here and can persuade her to take the kindest attitude towards her husband.”
“Madam!” broke in Dr. Gibson. (He was having difficulty in controlling his excitement.) “You are asking us to overstep the bounds of our professional duty. It is not for the physician to decide upon the attitude a wife should take toward her husband.”
“Dr. Gibson,” I replied, “that is what you propose to do, only you wish to conceal the fact. You would force Mrs. van Tuiver to accept your opinion of what a wife’s duty is.”
Dr. Perrin took command once more. “Our patient has asked for you, and she looks to you for guidance. You must put aside your own convictions and think of her health. You are the only person who can calm her, and surely it is your duty to do so!”
“I know that I might go in and lie again to my friend, but she knows too much to be deceived for very long. You know what a mind she has—a lawyer’s mind! How can I persuade her that the nurses—why, I do not even know what she heard the nurses say!”
“We have that all written down for you,” put in Dr. Perrin, quickly.
“You have their recollection of it, no doubt—but suppose they have forgotten some of it? Sylvia has not forgotten, you may be sure—every word is burned with fire into her brain. She has put with this everything she ever heard on the subject—the experience of her friend, Harriet Atkinson-all that I’ve told her in the past about such things——”
“Ah!” growled Dr. Gibson. “That’s it! If you had not meddled in the beginning——”
“Now, now!” said the other, soothingly. “You ask me to relieve you of the embarrassment of this matter. I quite agree with Mrs. Abbott that there is too much ignorance about these things, but she must recognise, I am sure, that this is not the proper moment for enlightening Mrs. van Tuiver.”
“I do not recognise it at all,” I said. “If her husband will go to her and tell her humbly and truthfully——”
“You are talking madness!” cried the old man, breaking loose again. “She would be hysterical—she would regard him as something loathsome—some kind of criminal——”
“Of course she would be shocked,” I said, “but she has the coolest head of anyone I know—I do not think of any man I would trust so fully to take a rational attitude in the end. We can explain to her what extenuating circumstances there are, and she will have to recognise them. She will see that we are considering her rights——”
“Herrights!” The old man fairly snorted the words.
“Now, now, Dr. Gibson!” interposed the other. “You asked me——”
“I know! I know! But as the older of the physicians in charge of this case——”
Dr. Perrin managed to frown him down, and went on trying to placate me. But through the argument I could hear the old man muttering in his collar a kind of double basspizzicato: “Suffragettes! Fanatics! Hysteria! Woman’s Rights!”
27. The breeze was feeble, and the sun was blazing hot, but nevertheless I made myself listen patiently for a while. They had said it all to me, over and over again; but it seemed that Dr. Perrin could not be satisfied until it had been said in Douglas van Tuiver’s presence.
“Dr. Perrin,” I exclaimed, “even supposing we make the attempt to deceive her, we have not one plausible statement to make——”
“You are mistaken, Mrs. Abbott,” said he. “We have the perfectly well-known fact that this disease is often contracted in ways which involve no moral blame. And in this case I believe I am in position to state how the accident happened.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know whether you heard that just before Mrs. van Tuiver’s confinement, I was called away to one of the other keys to attend a negro-woman. And since this calamity has befallen us, I have realized that I was possibly not as careful in sterilizing my instruments as I might have been. It is of course a dreadful thing for any physician to have to believe——”
He stopped, and there was a long silence. I gazed from one to another of the men. Two of them met my gaze; one did not. “He is going to let you say that?” I whispered, at last.
“Honour and fairness compel me to say it, Mrs. Abbott. I believe——”
But I interrupted him. “Listen to me, Dr. Perrin. You are a chivalrous gentleman, and you think you are helping a man in desperate need. But I say that anyone who would permit you to tell such a tale is a contemptible coward!”
“Madam,” cried Dr. Gibson, furiously, “there is a limit even to a woman’s rights!”
A silence followed. At last I resumed, in a low voice, “You gentlemen have your code: you protect the husband—you protect him at all hazards. I could understand this, if he were innocent of the offence in question; I could understand it if there were any possibility of his being innocent. But how can you protect him, when you know that he is guilty?”
“There can be no question of such knowledge!” cried the old doctor.
“I have no idea,” I said, “how much he has admitted to you; but let me remind you of one circumstance, which is known to Dr. Perrin—that I came to this place with the definite information that symptoms of the disease were to be anticipated. Dr. Perrin knows that I told that to Dr. Overton in New York. Has he informed you of it?”
There was an awkward interval. I glanced at van Tuiver, and I saw that he was leaning forward, staring at me. I thought he was about to speak, when Dr. Gibson broke in, excitedly, “All this is beside the mark! We have a serious emergency to face, and we are not getting anywhere. As the older of the physicians in charge of this case——”
And he went on to give me a lecture on the subject of authority. He talked for five minutes, ten minutes—I lost all track of the time. I had suddenly begun to picture how I would act and what I would say when I went into Sylvia’s room. What a state must Sylvia be in, while we sat out here in the blazing mid-day sun, discussing her right to freedom and knowledge!
28. “I have always been positive,” Dr. Gibson was saying, “but the present discussion has made me more positive than ever. As the older of the physicians in charge of this case, I say most emphatically that the patient shall not be told!”
I could not stand him any longer. “I am going to tell the patient,” I said.
“You shallnottell her!”
“But how will you prevent me?”
“You shall notseeher!”
“But she is determined to seeme!”
“She will be told that you are not there.”
“And how long do you imagine that that will satisfy her?”
There was a pause. They looked at van Tuiver, expecting him to speak. And so I heard once more his cold, deliberate voice. “We have done all we can. There can no longer be any question as to the course to be taken. Mrs. Abbott will not return to my home.”
“What?” I cried. I stared at him, aghast. “What do you mean?”
“I mean what I say—that you will not be taken back to the island.”
“But where will I be taken?”
“You will be taken to the mainland.”
I stared at the others. No one gave a sign. At last I whispered, “You woulddare?”
“You leave us no other alternative,” replied the master.
“You—you will practically kidnap me!” My voice must have been rather wild at that moment.
“You left my home of your own free will. I think I need hardly point out to you that I am not compelled to invite you back to it.”
“And what will Sylvia——” I stopped; appalled at the vista the words opened up.
“My wife,” said van Tuiver, “will ultimately choose between her husband and her most remarkable acquaintance.”
“And you gentlemen?” I turned to the others. “You would give your sanction to this outrageous action?”
“As the older of the physicians in charge of this case——” began Dr. Gibson.
I turned to van Tuiver again. “When your wife finds out what you have done to me—what will you answer?”
“We will deal with that situation when we come to it.”
“Of course,” I said, “you understand that sooner or later I shall get word to her!”
He answered, “We shall assume from now on that you are a mad woman, and shall take our precautions accordingly.”
Again there was a silence.
“The launch will return to the mainland,” said van Tuiver at last. “It will remain there until Mrs. Abbott sees fit to go ashore. May I ask if she has sufficient money in her purse to take her to New York?”
I could not help laughing. The thing was so wild—and yet I could see that from their point of view it was the only thing to do. “Mrs. Abbott is not certain that she is going back to New York,” I replied. “If she does go, it will not be with Mr. van Tuiver’s money.”
“One thing more,” said Dr. Perrin. It was the first time he had spoken since van Tuiver’s incredible announcement. “I trust, Mrs. Abbott, that this unfortunate situation may at all costs be concealed from servants, and from the world in general.”
From which I realized how badly I had them frightened. They actually saw me making physical resistance!
“Dr. Perrin,” I replied, “I am acting in this matter for my friend. I will add this: that I believe that you are letting yourself be overborne, and that you will regret it some day.”
He made no answer. Douglas van Tuiver put an end to the discussion by rising and signalling the other launch. When it had come alongside, he said to the captain, “Mrs. Abbott is going back to the railroad. You will take her at once.”
Then he waited; I was malicious enough to give him an anxious moment before I rose. Dr. Perrin offered me his hand; and Dr. Gibson said, with a smile, “Good-bye, Mrs. Abbott. I’m sorry you can’t stay with us any longer.”
I think it was something to my credit that I was able to play out the game before the boatmen. “I am sorry, too,” I countered. “I am hoping I shall be able to return.”
And then came the real ordeal. “Good-bye, Mrs. Abbott,” said Douglas van Tuiver, with his stateliest bow; and I managed to answer him!
As I took my seat, he beckoned his secretary. There was a whispered consultation for a minute or two, and then the master returned to the smaller launch with the doctors. He gave the word, and the two vessels set out—one to the key, and the other to the railroad. The secretary went in the one with me!
29. And here ends a certain stage of my story. I have described Sylvia as I met her and judged her; and if there be any reader who has been irked by this method, who thinks of me as a crude and pushing person, disposed to meddle in the affairs of others, here is where that reader will have his satisfaction and revenge. For if ever a troublesome puppet was jerked suddenly off the stage—if ever a long-winded orator was effectively snuffed out—I was that puppet and that orator. I stop and think—shall I describe how I paced up and down the pier, respectfully but emphatically watched by the secretary? And all the melodramatic plots I conceived, the muffled oars and the midnight visits to my Sylvia? My sense of humour forbids it. For a while now I shall take the hint and stay in the background of this story. I shall tell the experiences of Sylvia as Sylvia herself told them to me long afterwards; saying no more about my own fate—save that I swallowed my humiliation and took the next train to New York, a far sadder and wiser social-reformer!
1. Long afterwards Sylvia told me about what happened between her husband and herself; how desperately she tried to avoid discussing the issue with him—out of her very sense of fairness to him. But he came to her room, in spite of her protest, and by his implacable persistence he made her hear what he had to say. When he had made up his mind to a certain course of action, he was no more to be resisted than a glacier.
“Sylvia,” he said, “I know that you are upset by what has happened. I make every allowance for your condition; but there are some statements that I must be permitted to make, and there are simply no two ways about it—you must get yourself together and hear me.”
“Let me see Mary Abbott!” she insisted, again and again. “It may not be what you want—but I demand to see her.”
So at last he said, “You cannot see Mrs. Abbott. She has gone back to New York.” And then, at her look of consternation: “That is one of the things I have to talk to you about.”
“Why has she gone back?” cried Sylvia.
“Because I was unwilling to have her here.”
“You mean you sent her away?”
“I mean that she understood she was no longer welcome.”
Sylvia drew a quick breath and turned away to the window.
He took advantage of the opportunity to come near, and draw up a chair for her. “Will you not pleased to be seated,” he said. And at last she turned, rigidly, and seated herself.
“The time has come,” he declared, “when we have to settle this question of Mrs. Abbott, and her influence upon your life. I have argued with you about such matters, but now what has happened makes further discussion impossible. You were brought up among people of refinement, and it has been incredible to me that you should be willing to admit to your home such a woman as this—not merely of the commonest birth, but without a trace of the refinement to which you have been accustomed. And now you see the consequences of your having brought such a person into our life!”
He paused. She made no sound, and her gaze was riveted upon the window-curtain.
“She happens to be here,” he went on, “at a time when a dreadful calamity befalls us—when we are in need of the utmost sympathy and consideration. Here is an obscure and terrible affliction, which has baffled the best physicians in the country; but this ignorant farmer’s wife considers that she knows all about it. She proceeds to discuss it with every one—sending your poor aunt almost into hysterics, setting the nurses to gossiping—God knows what else she has done, or what she will do, before she gets through. I don’t pretend to know her ultimate purpose—blackmail, possibly——”
“Oh, how can you!” she broke out, involuntarily. “How can you say such a thing about a friend of mine?”
“I might answer with another question—how can you have such a friend? A woman who has cast off every restraint, every consideration of decency—and yet is able to persuade a daughter of the Castlemans to make her an intimate! Possibly she is an honest fanatic. Dr. Perrin tells me she was the wife of a brutal farmer, who mistreated her. No doubt that has embittered her against men, and accounts for her mania. You see that her mind leaped at once to the most obscene and hideous explanation of this misfortune of ours—an explanation which pleased her because it blackened the honour of a man.”
He stopped again. Sylvia’s eyes had moved back to the window-curtain.
“I am not going to insult your ears,” he said, “with discussions of her ideas. The proper person to settle such matters is a physician, and if you wish Dr. Perrin to do so, he will tell you what he knows about the case. But I wish you to realize somehow what this thing has meant to me. I have managed to control myself——” He saw her shut her lips more tightly. “The doctors tell me that I must not excite you. But picture the situation. I come to my home, bowed down with grief for you and for my child. And this mad woman thrusts herself forward, shoves aside your aunt and your physicians, and comes in the launch to meet me at the station. And then she accuses me of being criminally guilty of the blindness of my child—of having wilfully deceived my wife! Think of it—that is my welcome to my home!”
“Douglas,” she cried, wildly, “Mary Abbott would not have done such a thing without reason——”
“I do not purpose to defend myself,” he said, coldly. “If you are bent upon filling your mind with such matters, go to Dr. Perrin. He will tell you that he, as a physician, knows that the charge against me is preposterous. He will tell you that even granting that the cause of the blindness is what Mrs. Abbott guesses, there are a thousand ways in which such an infection can be contracted, which are perfectly innocent, involving no guilt on the part of anyone. Every doctor knows that drinking-cups, wash-basins, towels, even food, can be contaminated. He knows that any person can bring the affliction into a home—servants, nurses, even the doctors themselves. Has your mad woman friend told you any of that?”
“She has told me nothing. You know that I have had no opportunity to talk with her. I only know what the nurses believe——”
“They believe what Mrs. Abbott told them. That is absolutely all the reason they have for believing anything!”
She did not take that quite as he expected. “So Mary Abbottdidtell them!” she cried.
He hurried on: “The poisonous idea of a vulgar Socialist woman—this is the thing upon which you base your suspicions of your husband!”
“Oh!” she whispered, half to herself. “Mary Abbottdidsay it!”
“What if she did?”
“Oh, Douglas, Mary would never have said such a thing to a nurse unless she had been certain of it!”
“Certain?” he broke out. “What certainty could she imagine she had? She is a bitter, frantic woman—a divorced woman—who jumped to the conclusion that pleased her, because it involved the humiliation of a rich man.”
He went on, his voice trembling with suppressed passion: “When you know the real truth, the thing becomes a nightmare. You, a delicate woman, lying here helpless—the victim of a cruel misfortune, and with the life of an afflicted infant depending upon your peace of mind. Your physicians planning day and night to keep you quiet, to keep the dreadful, unbearable truth from you——”
“Oh, what truth? That’s the terrifying thing—to know that people are keeping things from me! Whatwasit they were keeping?”
“First of all, the fact that the baby was blind; and then the cause of it——”
“Then theydoknow the cause?”
“They don’t know positively—no one can know positively. But poor Dr. Perrin had a dreadful idea, that he had to hide from you because otherwise he could not bear to continue in your house——”
“Why, Douglas! What do you mean?”
“I mean that a few days before your confinement, he was called away to the case of a negro-woman—you knew that, did you not?”
“Go on.”
“He had the torturing suspicion that possibly he was not careful enough in sterilizing his instruments, and that he, your friend and protector, may be the man who is to blame.”
“Oh! Oh!” Her voice was a whisper of horror.
“That is one of the secrets your doctors have been trying to hide.”
There was silence, while her eyes searched his face. Suddenly she stretched out her hands to him, crying desperately: “Oh, is this true?”
He did not take the outstretched hands. “Since I am upon the witness-stand, I have to be careful of my replies. It is what Dr. Perrin tells me. Whether the explanation he gives is the true one—whether he himself, or the nurse he recommended, may have brought the infection——”
“It couldn’t have been the nurse,” she said quickly. “She was so careful——”
He did not allow her to finish. “You seem determined,” he said, coldly, “to spare everyone but your husband.”
“No!” she protested, “I have tried hard to be fair—to be fair to both you and my friend. Of course, if Mary Abbott was mistaken, I have done you a great injustice—”
He saw that she was softening, and that it was safe for him to be a man. “It has been with some difficulty that I have controlled myself throughout this experience,” he said, rising to his feet. “If you do not mind, I think I will not carry the discussion any further, as I don’t feel that I can trust myself to listen to a defence of that woman from your lips. I will only tell you my decision in the matter. I have never before used my authority as a husband; I hoped I should never have to use it. But the time has come when you will have to choose between Mary Abbott and your husband. I will positively not tolerate your corresponding with her, or having anything further to do with her. I take my stand upon that, and nothing will move me. I will not even permit of any discussion of the subject. And now I hope you will excuse me. Dr. Perrin wishes me to tell you that either he or Dr. Gibson are ready at any time to advise you about these matters, which have been forced upon your mind against their judgment and protests.”
2. You can see that it was no easy matter for Sylvia to get at the truth. The nurses, already terrified because of their indiscretion, had been first professionally thrashed, and then carefully drilled as to the answers they were to make. But as a matter of fact they did not have to make any answers at all, because Sylvia was unwilling to reveal to anyone her distrust of her husband.
One of two things was certain: either she had been horribly wronged by her husband, or now she was horribly wronging him. Which was the truth? Was it conceivable that I, Mary Abbott, would leap to a false conclusion about such a matter? She knew that I felt intensely, almost fanatically, on the subject, and also that I had been under great emotional stress. Was it possible that I would have voiced mere suspicions to the nurses? Sylvia could not be sure, for my standards were as strange to her as my Western accent. She knew that I talked freely to everyone about such matters—and would be as apt to select the nurses as the ladies of the house. On the other hand, how was it conceivable that I could know positively? To recognize a disease might be easy; but to specify from what source it had come—that was surely not in my power!
They did not leave her alone for long. Mrs. Tuis came in, with her feminine terrors. “Sylvia, you must know that you are treating your husband dreadfully! He has gone away down the beach by himself, and has not even seen his baby!”
“Aunt Varina—” she began, “won’t you please go away?”
But the other rushed on: “Your husband comes here, broken with grief because of this affliction; and you overwhelm him with the most cruel and wicked reproaches with charges you have no way in the world of proving——” And the old lady caught her niece by the hand. “My child! Come, do your duty!”
“My duty?”
“Make yourself fit, and take your husband to see his baby.”
“Oh, I can’t!” cried Sylvia. “I don’t want to be there when he sees her! If I loved him—” Then, seeing her aunt’s face of horror, she was seized with a sudden impulse of pity, and caught the poor old lady in her arms. “Aunt Varina,” she said, “I am making you suffer, I know—I am making everyone suffer! But if you only knew how I am suffering myself! How can I know what to do.”
Mrs. Tuis was weeping; but quickly she got herself together, and answered in a firm voice, “Your old auntie can tell you what to do. You must come to your senses, my child—you must let your reason prevail. Get your face washed, make yourself presentable, and come and take your husband to see your baby. Women have to suffer, dear; we must not shirk our share of life’s burdens.”
“There is no danger of my shirking,” said Sylvia, bitterly.
“Come, dear, come,” pleaded Mrs. Tuis. She was trying to lead the girl to the mirror. If only she could be made to see how distraught and disorderly she looked! “Let me help you to dress, dear—you know how much better it always makes you feel.”
Sylvia laughed, a trifle wildly—but Mrs. Tuis had dealt with hysteria before. “What would you like to wear?” she demanded. And then, without waiting for an answer, “Let me choose something. One of your pretty frocks.”
“A pretty frock, and a seething volcano underneath! That is your idea of a woman’s life!”
The other responded very gravely, “A pretty frock, my dear, and a smile—instead of a vulgar scene, and ruin and desolation afterwards.”
Sylvia made no reply. Yes, that was the life of woman—her old aunt knew! And her old aunt knew also the psychology of her sex. She did not go on talking about pretty frocks in the abstract; she turned at once to the clothes-closet, and began laying pretty frocks upon the bed!
3. Sylvia emerged upon the “gallery,” clad in dainty pink muslin, her beautiful shiny hair arranged under a semi-invalid’s cap of pink maline. Her face was pale, and the big red-brown eyes were hollow; but she was quiet, and apparently mistress of herself again. She even humoured Aunt Varina by leaning slightly upon her feeble arm, while the maid hastened to place her chair in a shaded spot.
Her husband came, and the doctors; the tea-things were brought, and Aunt Varina poured tea, a-flutter with excitement. They talked about the comparative temperatures of New York and the Florida Keys, and about hedges of jasmine to shade the gallery from the evening sun. And after a while, Aunt Varina arose, explaining that she would prepare Elaine for her father’s visit. In the doorway she stood for a moment, smiling upon the pretty picture; it was all settled now—the outward forms had been observed, and the matter would end, as such matters should end between husband and wife—a few tears, a few reproaches, and then a few kisses.
The baby was made ready, with a new dress, and a fresh silk bandage to cover the pitiful, lifeless eyes. Aunt Varina had found pleasure in making these bandages; she made them soft and pretty—less hygienic, perhaps, but avoiding the suggestion of the hospital.
When Sylvia and her husband came into the room, the faces of both of them were white. Sylvia stopped near the door-way; and poor Aunt Varina fluttered about, in agony of soul. When van Tuiver went to the cradle, she hurried to his side, and sought to awaken the little one with gentle nudges. Quite unexpectedly to her, van Tuiver sought to pick up the infant; she helped him, and he stood, holding it awkwardly, as if afraid it might go to pieces in his arms.
So any man might appear, with his first infant; but to Sylvia it seemed the most tragic sight she had ever seen in her life. She gave a low cry, “Douglas!” and he turned, and she saw his face was working with the feeling he was ashamed for anyone to see. “Oh, Douglas,” she whispered, “I’m sosorryfor you!” At which Aunt Varina decided that it was time for her to make her escape.
4. But the trouble between these two were not such as could be settled by any burst of emotion. The next day they were again in a dispute, for he had come to ask her word of honour that she would never see me again, and would give him my letters to be returned unopened. This last was what she had let her father do in the case of Frank Shirley; and she had become certain in her own mind that she had done wrong.
But he was insistent in his demand; declaring that it should be obvious to her there could be no peace of mind for him so long as my influence continued in her life.
“But surely,” protested Sylvia, “to hear Mary Abbott’s explanation——”
“There can be no explanation that is not an insult to your husband, and to those who are caring for you. I am speaking in this matter not merely for myself, but for your physicians, who know this woman, heard her menaces and her vulgarity. It is their judgment that you should be protected at all hazards from further contact with her.”
“Douglas,” she argued, “you must realize that I am in distress of mind about this matter——”
“I certainly realize that.”
“And if you are thinking of my welfare, you should choose a course that would set my mind at rest. But when you come to me and ask me that I should not even read a letter from my friend—don’t you realize what you suggest to me, that there is something you are afraid for me to know?”
“I do not attempt to deny my fear of this woman. I have seen how she has been able to poison your mind with suspicions——”
“Yes, Douglas—but now that has been done. What else is there to fear from her?”
“I have no idea what. She is a bitter, jealous woman, with a mind full of hatred; and you are an innocent girl, who cannot judge about these matters. What idea have you of the world in which you live, of the slanders to which a man in your husband’s position is exposed?”
“I am not quite such a child as that——”
“You have simply no idea, I tell you. I remember your consternation when we first met, and I told you about the woman who had written me a begging letter, and got an interview with me, and then started screaming, and refused to leave the house till I had paid her a lot of money. You had never heard such stories, had you? Yet it is the kind of thing that is happening to rich men continually; it was one of the first rules I was taught, never to let myself be alone with a strange woman, no matter of what age, or under what circumstances.”
“But, I assure you, I would not listen to such people——”
“You are asking right now to listen! And you would be influenced by her—you could not help it, any more than you can help being distressed about what she has already said. She intimated to Dr. Perrin that she believed that I had been a man of depraved life, and that my wife and child were now paying the penalty. How can I tell what vile stories concerning me she may not have heard? How could I have any peace of mind while I knew that she was free to pour them into your ear?”
Sylvia sat dumb with questions she would not utter, hovering on the tip of her tongue.
He took her silence for acquiesence, and went on, quickly, “Let me give you an illustration. A friend of mine whom you know well—I might as well tell you his name, it was Freddie Atkins—was at supper with some theatrical women; and one of them, not having any idea that Freddie knew me, proceeded to talk about me, and how she had met me, and where we had been together—about my yacht, and my castle in Scotland, and I don’t know what all else. It seems that this woman had been my mistress for several years; she told quite glibly about me and my habits. Freddie got the woman’s picture, on some pretext or other, and brought it to me; I had never laid eyes on her in my life. He could hardly believe it, and to prove it to him I offered to meet the woman, under another name. We sat in a restaurant, and she told the tale to Freddie and myself together—until finally he burst out laughing, and told her who I was.”
He paused, to let this sink in. “Now, suppose your friend, Mary Abbott, had met that woman! I don’t imagine she is particularly careful whom she associates with; and suppose she had come and told you that she knew such a woman—what would you have said? Can you deny that the tale would have made an impression on you? Yet, I’ve not the least doubt there are scores of women who made such tales about me a part of their stock in trade; there are thousands of women whose fortunes would be made for life if they could cause such a tale to be believed. And imagine how well-informed they would be, if anyone were to ask them concerning my habits, and the reason why our baby is blind! I tell you, when the rumour concerning our child has begun to spread, there will be ten thousand people in New York city who will know of first-hand, personal knowledge exactly how it happened, and how you took it, and everything that I said to you about it. There will be sneers in the society-papers, from New York to San Francisco; and smooth-tongued gentlemen calling, to give us hints that we can stop these sneers by purchasing a de-luxe edition of a history of our ancestors for six thousand dollars. There will be well-meaning and beautiful-souled people who will try to get you to confide in them, and then use their knowledge of your domestic unhappiness to blackmail you; there will be threats of law-suits from people who will claim that they have contracted a disease from you or your child—your laundress, perhaps, or your maid, or one of these nurses——”
“Oh, stop! stop!” she cried.
“I am quite aware,” he said, quietly, “that these things are not calculated to preserve the peace of mind of a young mother. You are horrified when I tell you of them—yet you clamour for the right to have Mrs. Abbott tell you of them! I warn you, Sylvia—you have married a rich man, who is exposed to the attacks of cunning and unscrupulous enemies. You, as his wife, are exactly as much exposed—possibly even more so. Therefore when I see you entering into what I know to be a dangerous intimacy, I must have the right to say to you, This shall stop, and I tell you, there can never be any safety or peace of mind for either of us, so long as you attempt to deny me that right.”
5. Dr. Gibson took his departure three or four days later; and before he went, he came to give her his final blessing; talking to her, as he phrased it, “like a Dutch uncle.” “You must understand,” he said, “I am almost old enough to be your grandfather. I have four sons, anyone of whom might have married you, if they had had the good fortune to be in Castleman County at the critical time. So you must let me be frank with you.”
Sylvia indicated that she was willing.
“We don’t generally talk to women about these matters; because they’ve no standard by which to judge, and they almost always fly off and have hysterics. Their case seems to them exceptional and horrible, their husbands the blackest criminals in the whole tribe.”
He paused for a moment. “Now, Mrs. van Tuiver, the disease which has made your baby blind is probably what we call gonorrhea. When it gets into the eyes, it has very terrible results. But it doesn’t often get into the eyes, and for the most part it’s a trifling affair, that we don’t worry about. I know there are a lot of new-fangled notions, but I’m an old man, with experience of my own, and I have to have things proven to me. I know that with as much of this disease as we doctors see, if it was a deadly disease, there’d be nobody left alive in the world. As I say, I don’t like to discuss it with women; but it was not I who forced the matter upon your attention——”
“Pray go on, Dr. Gibson,” she said. “I really wish to know all that you will tell me.”
“The question has come up, how was this disease brought to your child? Dr. Perrin suggested that possibly he—you understand his fear; and possibly he is correct. But it seems to me an illustration of the unwisdom of a physician’s departing from his proper duty, which is to cure people. If you wish to find out who brought a disease, what you need is a detective. I know, of course, that there are people who can combine the duties of physician and detective—and that without any previous preparation or study of either profession.”
He waited for this irony to sink in; and Sylvia also waited, patiently.
At last he resumed, “The idea has been planted in your mind that your husband brought the trouble; and that idea is sure to stay there and fester. So it becomes necessary for someone to talk to you straight. Let me tell you that eight men out of ten have had this disease at some time in their lives; also that very few of them were cured of it when they thought they were. You have a cold: and then next month, you say the cold is gone. So it is, for practical purposes. But if I take a microscope, I find the germs of the cold still in your membranes, and I know that you can give a cold, and a bad cold, to some one else who is sensitive. It is true that you may go through all the rest of your life without ever being entirely rid of that cold. You understand me?”
“Yes,” said Sylvia, in a low voice.
“I say eight out of ten. Estimates would differ. Some doctors would say seven out of ten—and some actual investigations have shown nine out of ten. And understand me, I don’t mean bar-room loafers and roustabouts. I mean your brothers, if you have any, your cousins, your best friends, the men who came to make love to you, and whom you thought of marrying. If you had found it out about any one of them, of course you’d have cut the acquaintance; yet you’d have been doing an injustice—for if you had done that to all who’d ever had the disease, you might as well have retired to a nunnery at once.”
The old gentleman paused again; then frowning at her under his bushy eye-brows, he exclaimed, “I tell you, Mrs. van Tuiver, you’re doing your husband a wrong. Your husband loves you, and he’s a good man—I’ve had some talks with him, and I know he’s not got nearly so much on his conscience as the average husband. I’m a Southern man, and I know these gay young bloods you’ve danced and flirted with all your young life. Do you think if you went probing into their secret affairs, you’d have had much pleasure in their company afterwards? I tell you again, you’re doing your husband a wrong! You’re doing something that very few men would stand, as patiently as he has stood it so far.”
All this time Sylvia had given no sign. So the old gentleman began to feel a trifle uneasy. “Mind you,” he said, “I’m not saying that men ought to be like that. They deserve a good hiding, most of them—they’re very few of them fit to associate with a good woman. I’ve always said that no man is really good enough for a good woman. But my point is that when you select one to punish, you select not the guiltiest one, but simply the one who’s had the misfortune to fall under suspicion. And he knows that’s not fair; he’d have to be more than human if deep in his soul he did not bitterly resent it. You understand me?”
“I understand,” she replied, in the same repressed voice.
And the doctor rose and laid his hand on her shoulder. “I’m going home,” he said—“very probably we’ll never meet each other again. I see you making a great mistake, laying up unhappiness for yourself in the future; and I wish to prevent it if I can. I wish to persuade you to face the facts of the world in which we live. So I am going to tell you something that I never expected I should tell to a lady.”
He was looking her straight in the eye. “You see me—I’m an old man, and I seem fairly respectable to you. You’ve laughed at me some, but even so, you’ve found it possible to get along with me without too great repugnance. Well, I’ve had this disease; I’ve had it, and nevertheless I’ve raised six fine, sturdy children. More than that—I’m not free to name anybody else, but I happen to know positively that among the men your husband employs on this island there are two who have the disease right now. And the next charming and well-bred gentleman you are introduced to, just reflect that there are at least eight chances in ten that he has had the disease, and perhaps three or four in ten that he has it at the minute he’s shaking hands with you. And now you think that over, and stop tormenting your poor husband!”