"Thecanailles! The thieves! The robbers!"
"What is it?" said Nancy.
"They have given me one hundred and fifty francs!" and he held out the three fifty-franc notes contemptuously.
"A hundred—and—fifty francs!" gasped Nancy.
"Nancy, there is only one thing to do," said Aldo. "Go in and play them. Plank them down on a number, and if they go, let them go, and be done with."
"Do it," said Nancy, for nothing mattered.
"I can't," said Aldo. "I can't go in—not until this miserable dole is paid back. You must go. They will let you in. Go on."
Nancy rose, flushed and trembling. "What do I do? How do I play it?"
"Oh, anyhow. It makes no difference," said Aldo, with his face in his hands, suddenly realizing that they three possessed in the world one hundred and ninety francs, and a debt of one hundred and twenty-three. He turned to the child.
"Say a number, Anne-Marie! Any old number!"
Anne-Marie did not understand.
"You know your numbers, darling," said Nancy, "that grandmamma taught you."
"Oh, yeth," said Anne-Marie. "One, two, three, four."
"Stop. All right," said Aldo. "Nancy, go in and play—at any table you like—thequatre premiersandquatre en plein. That gives you zero, too. Go ahead!Les quatre premiersandquatre en plein. Remember. Tell the croupier to do it for you."
Nancy went straight in, and to the left, where the men sat who had laughed at her the night before. They recognized her, and gave her a card at once.
She went into the rooms. Chink, chink; chink, chink. She went to the table on the left. A red-haired croupier sat at the end of the table nearest her, and she went to him, and gave him one of the fifty-franc notes.
"Les quatre premiers et quatre en plein," she said.
But it was too late. "Rien ne va plus," said the man in the centre. "Trente-deux, noir, pair et passe."
The croupier handed her back the note. "You're lucky," he said. "You would have lost." She repeated her phrase, and he put the note on the top of his rakeand passed it across the table. "Quatre premiers," he said, and the man in the middle placed it.
"Et quoi encore?" said the croupier, looking at Nancy.
"Quatre premiers et quatre en plein," repeated Nancy, mechanically.
"Combien à l'en plein?" said the man, holding out his hand.
Nancy gave him the second fifty-franc note, and he passed it up on his rake. "Quatre en plein."
"Quatre en plein. Tout va aux billets," said the man in the centre; and the ball whizzed round. Nancy's heart was thumping; it shook her; it beat like a drum. The little ball dropped, ran along awhile, stopped, clattered and clicked, and fell into a compartment.
"Trois."
Everybody looked at Nancy as she was paid, and she collected the gold and silver with clumsy hands. "Encore," she said, giving the croupier the remaining bill and some louis.
"Quoi?" said the croupier.
"Encore la même chose." The ball was running round.
"Mais ça y est," said the croupier, for the fifty-franc note that had won still lay at the corner of the top line.
"Mais non, mais non," said Nancy, who was very much confused, "premier quatre"—the man placed the note on the other note still lying there—"et quatre en plein." But for this last it was too late.
"Rien ne va plus. Zéro!"
"Voilà! ça y est!" said the croupier, returning the gold to her, and waiting with the rake on the table for the eight hundred francs to be paid.
What is the secret of luck? How shall it be forced? How explained? Whatever Nancy did, she won.Wherever her money lay there the ball went. When she thought she had enough—her hands were full, her place at the table was piled up with louis and silver and notes—and she was withdrawing her remaining stake and the gold paid on it with clumsy rake, she moved it away from the numbers, and left it on "pair" while she put down the rake. A minute was lost while a woman said something to her, and before she could take the money up the ball had fallen. "Vingt. Pair et passe." It was doubled.
When she at last tremblingly collected it all in her hands, and put gold and notes as best she could into her pocket, she rose, and could hardly see. Her cheeks were flaming. She passed out of the rooms, into the atrium, and down the steps. Aldo sat on the bench with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands and the doll in his arms. Anne-Marie was running up and down in front of him.
"Aldo," said Nancy, and sat down weakly at his side.
"Gone?" asked Aldo, raising a miserable face.
"No!" Nancy had a little hysterical laugh. She piled the money into his hands, then into her lap, while he counted it quickly, deftly. People passing looked at them, and smiled.
"Seven thousand eight hundred francs," said Aldo, very pale.
"Oh, but there is more;" and Nancy dived into her pocket again. There was over fourteen thousand francs.
"Come into the Café de Paris," said Aldo.
They drank coffee andcrème de menthe, and Anne-Marie had strawberry ice and cakes. The band played "Sous la Feuillée."
"Oh what a lovely world it is!" said Nancy, with alittle sob. "Oh, what a glorious place! I love it all! I love everybody!"
"I love evlybody," said Anne-Marie, taking a third cake with careful choice. Aldo and Nancy laughed.
The Englishman passed, and Nancy called him. She introduced him to Aldo, and Aldo thanked him for being kind to Nancy the evening before. Nancy told him about the fourteen thousand francs she had won, and they all laughed, and the band played, and the sun shone and went down.
"The best train for Italy," said Mr. Allen suddenly, "is at six-twenty. You have just an hour. It's a splendid train. You get to Milan at eleven."
Aldo looked at Nancy, and Nancy looked at the sky. It was light and tender, and the air was still. The Tsiganes were playing "Violets," and in the distance lay the sea.
"We must take that train," said Aldo, getting up and rapping his saucer for the waiter.
"Oh no!" said Nancy. "Please not! Let us stay here and be happy."
"Stay here and be happy," said Anne-Marie, with a bewitching smile.
They stayed.
Aldo repaid theviatiqueand went into the gambling-rooms with Nancy. The proprietress of the hotel got them abonnefrom Vintimille, who walked up and down in the gardens with Anne-Marie, and carried the doll. She cost nothing—only fifty francs a month! They arranged to takepensionat the hotel. That also cost nothing—twelve francs a day each. They took drivesthat cost nothing—sixteen francs to La Turbie, twenty francs to Cap Martin. Nothing cost anything. Ten minutes at the tables, and Nancy had won enough to pay everything for a month.
She sent a cloak to her mother, which Valeria vowed was much too beautiful to wear. She sent presents to Aunt Carlotta and Zio Giacomo, to Adèle and to Nino, to Carlo and to Clarissa. And she remembered a man with no legs, who sat in a little cart on the Corso in Milan, and she sent her mother one hundred francs to give him. Anne-Marie was dressed in a white corded silk coat, and a white-plumed hat. Thebonnehad a large Scotch bow with streamers.
This lasted ten days. On the eleventh day it was ended. Nancy played gaily, and lost. She played carefully, and lost. She played tremblingly, and lost. She played recklessly, and lost. Aldo, who did not trust his own luck, followed her from table to table, saying: "Be careful!... Don't!... Do!... Why did you? Why didn't you? I told you so!" And at each tablela guignewas waiting for them, pushing Nancy's hand in the wrong direction, whispering the wrong numbers in her ear. Ten times they made up their minds to stop, and ten times they decided to try just once more. "We have about nine thousand francs left. With that we are paupers for the rest of our lives. With luck we might recoup."
This lasted two days. On the third day they had one thousand and eighty francs left. "Play the eighty," said Aldo, "and we will keep the thousand." They lost the eighty, and then four hundred francs more. "What is the good of six hundred francs," said Aldo, and they played on.
Their last two louis Aldo threw on atransversale. They won. "Let us leave it all on," said Aldo. They won again.
"Shall we risk it again?" said Nancy, with flushed cheeks and galloping heart.
Aldo's lips were dry and pale; he could not speak. He nodded. And a third time they won. The croupier flattened the notes out on the table and knocked the little pile of gold lightly over with his rake. He counted, and paid five times the already quintupled stake.
Aldo bent forward and picked up a rake to draw in his winnings. A man sitting near the centre of the table put out his hand, and took the piled-up notes and gold.
"Ah,pardon!" cried Aldo, striking the rake down on the notes and holding them; "that is mine."
"Pardon! pardon! pardon!" said the man, laying his hand firmly on the notes. "C'est ma mise à moi! Voilà déjà trois coups que je l'y laisse——"
Aldo was incoherent with excitement, and Nancy joined in, very pale. "It is ours, monsieur."
"Ah, mais c'est par trop fort," cried the other, who was French, and had a loud voice. He pushed Aldo's rake aside, and took the money.
Aldo appealed to the croupiers, and to the people near him, and to the people opposite him. They shrugged their shoulders and raised their eyebrows. They had not seen, they did not know.
"Faites vos jeux, messieurs," said the croupier.
The ball whizzed; the game went on. Aldo, burning with rage, and Nancy pale and dazed, left the table.
"Oh, Aldo! Let us go away. This is a horrible place. Let us go away."
Aldo did not answer.
They went out into the sunshine. Laughing women lifting light dresses and showing their high heels came hurrying across the square. The warm air was heavy with the scent of flowers. They turned into the gardens, and before them was the dancing sea; and Anne-Marie, looking like an Altezza Serenissima, tripped up and down in her white corded silk coat, her brief curls bobbing under her white-plumed hat.
Behind her walked the Vintimille servant with the Scotch silk bow on her head, and carried the doll with the real eyelashes.
New York.
Mother Dear,
I shall send you this letter when nothing that I have written in it is true any more. If we ever live through and out of it, you shall know; if not—but, of course, we shall. We must. One cannot die of poverty, can one? One does not really, actually suffer real hunger, does one, mother dear? "Zu Grunde gehen!" The sombre old German words keep rumbling in my head like far-away thunder. "Zu Grunde gehen!"
I do not suppose one really does go "zu Grunde." But when one has forty-five dollars in the world, and a funny little bird with its beak open expecting to be fed—and fed on chocolates and bonbons when it wants them—one becomes demoralized and frightened, and pretends to think that one might really starve.
Do not think it unkind that I did not come to Milan to kiss you and say good-bye. I had not the heart to do so. Aldo, too, said we could not afford it, and, indeed,our combinedviatiquesand our jewellery only just enabled us to come here.
We landed three days ago. Yesterday morning I sent you a postcard: "Arrived happily." Happily! Oh, mother dear, I think there must be a second higher and happier heaven for those who are brave enough to tell untruths of this kind. Enough; we landed, Anne-Marie looking like a spoilt princess; I with my Monte Carlo hat and coat, and high-heeled, impertinent shoes; and Aldo, a pallid Antinous, with forty-five dollars in his pocket-book.
Then came the Via Crucis of looking for rooms. Mother, did I ever stay at the Hôtel Nazionale in Rome, and descend languidly the red-carpeted stairs to the royal automobile that was to drive me to the Quirinal? Did I ever sit at home in Uncle Giacomo's large arm-chair and listen benignly to moon-struck poets reading their songs? Did I ever with languid fingers ring bells for servants, and order what I wanted?
"Cio avvenne forse ai tempiD'Omero e di Valmichi——"
That was another Nancy. This Nancy trudged for hours through straight and terrible streets called avenues, with a dismal husband and a tired baby at her side. Third Avenue, Fourth Avenue, then quickly across Fifth Avenue, which had nothing to do with us, and again across to Sixth Avenue ... and everywhere dirty shops, screaming children, jostling girls, rude men, trains rushing overhead, street-cars screeching and clanging. Then, at last, Seventh Avenue, where there were streets full of quiet, squalid boarding-houses, fewer screaming children, fewer dirty shops, and no trains.We went into a cheap, clean-looking place that a porter had told us of. A woman opened. She looked at my hat and coat, and at my shoes, and said: "What do you want?" "A room——" began Aldo. She shut the door without answering. At the next house a woman in a dirty silk dressing-gown opened the door. "Yes, they had rooms. Eight dollars a day. Meals a dollar." In the next house they took no children. In the next, no foreigners. Our expensive clothes in their cheap street made them suspicious. Aldo's handsome face made them suspicious. His Italian accent frightened them. And Anne-Marie cried every time a new face appeared at a new door.
At last Aldo said: "I will go to the Italian consul. You wait here in a baker's shop." The consulate was at the other end of New York, and was closed when Aldo got there. When he returned, harassed and haggard, I had made friends with the baker's wife. She was German. I told her our History of the Wolf—that I was a poetess, and had met the Queen, and all about Monte Carlo. I don't think she believed or understood much, but she was sorry for me; and Anne-Marie, hearing us talk German, suddenly started piping: "Schlaf, Kindchen, schlaf!" The woman caught her up in her arms, and said: "Ach, du süsses! How does she come to know that?" And she took us all to 28th Street to the house of her sister, who gave us this room. It is clean, and the woman is kind.
And now, what?
I have bought myself a frightful pepper-and-salt coloured dress, and a black straw hat. I look like a "deserving poor." And Anne-Marie is wearing a dark blue woolly horror belonging to the woman's daughter.She must wear it, or Frau Schmidl would be offended. Frau Schmidl is the only friend we have in America.
For the ranch is a myth of Aldo's. He never was on a ranch in his life. He met a Frenchman once with weak lungs, who had been in Texas, and who gave him all the romantic details that he used to recount to us. Do you remember, mother? On Lake Maggiore? He talked vaguely, and not much, it is true, of those bucking bronchoes he used to ride across the sweeping Western prairies, feeling the wind in his hair.... When I reproach him for his fables, he tells me that it was our fault. We insisted upon the details. We would hear all about it! He says Clarissa started the ranch legend, because she thought it sounded well. Then she left him to keep it up as best he could. Poor Aldo! He hates us in these clothes. And he hates the German things Frau Schmidl gives us to eat. He has gone to the Italian Consul for the third time to see if he can find some correspondence to do. I could give lessons, but it seems that there are many more people who want to give lessons than there are who want to take them. And then—there is Anne-Marie, who has to be taken care of. Anne-Marie! Frau Schmidl loves her because of her name. She says it is echt deutsch! She is a stout, fair woman, who speaks English strangely. When she enters the room, she says, nodding and laughing, "Now, and what makes the Anne-Marie?"
The Anne-Marie likes the sound of the language, and imitates her. I dread to think what English the Anne-Marie will learn.
Aldo has found nothing to do. The Americans will have nothing to do with an Italian, and Italians willhave still less to do with an Italian. We have eight dollars left.
If I write to you for money you will send it. And then? A few weeks hence we shall be where we are now. We must fight our battles alone.
We have nothing left.
Mr. Schmidl says he will let us keep the room—"for another week or two," he added gruffly; but his wife is not to feed us. "At least—not all of you," he added still more gruffly. "Only you—and the Anne-Marie." He is a poor man. He is quite right. But what about Aldo?
We have sold the Monte Carlo clothes for twelve dollars. We feel that we are rehabilitated. And what have I been dreaming of? I can write. I shall send an article to theGiornale Italo-Americano. Unsigned, of course. I shall write it to-night.
It is done.
It is accepted.
It is printed.
It seems that that is all. They have told Aldo that they never pay for articles that are sent to them from the outside—even if they are as brilliant and original as this one. They only pay their own staff. Have they room on their staff for a brilliant and original writer? Plenty of room. But no money.
Aldo is living on dates and a little rice. He speaks less than ever. I do not know what his thoughts are. I am afraid for him.
To-day as I was taking Anne-Marie for a run in front of the house I met a man whom we knew in Italy, a Dr. Fioretti. He was an old friend of Nino's. Do you remember? He looked at me, and past me, blankly, unrecognizing. I thanked the fates. My knees ached with fear lest he should stop and say: "You here! What are you doing? Where do you live?" Where do I live? In this vile street near the negro quarter. What am I doing? Starving. Are we dreaming, mother? Oh, mother! mother! when did I fall asleep? I should like to wake up a little girl again in England. Was there not another little girl called Edith, with yellow hair? Surely I remember her. What became of her?... Or was she the girl who died?...
Aldo will not leave the house any more. He will not speak to us any more. He sits and stares at us. I am afraid of him. I shall telegraph to you if I can find the money to do so. Mrs. Schmidl keeps Anne-Marie downstairs in her kitchen. But she is afraid of Aldo, too. I think they will turn us out. But they will keep the child, and take care of her.
I shall go out. I shall ask everybody, anybody, to help me....
I have been to the Italian Church, to the Italian Consul, to the Italian Embassy. They will see. They will do what they can. There are many pitiable cases. Are we a "pitiable case"? How strange! They would not give me any money to send a telegram. Theysaid they would telegraph themselves, after they had come to see us, and made inquiries....
I stopped a woman in the street, and said, "I beg your pardon. Will you——" and then my courage failed and I asked where West 28th Street was. She directed me, and I turned back and walked in the direction I had come from.
I came to Fifth Avenue, and walked up it in my shabby clothes. I passed rows of large houses. One of them had the windows open, and someone inside was playing "Der Musikant" of Hugo Wolff. And a woman's voice was singing:
"Wenn wir zwei zusammen wärenWürd' das Singen mir vergeh'n."
I stopped. I turned back, and walked up the wide stone steps. I rang the visitors' bell, and a manservant in ornate livery opened at once.
"I wish to speak to the lady who is singing," I said.
"Oh," said the man. I knew he thought me a beggar, and was going to send me away.
"Tell her—tell her quickly," I said, "that—that Hugo Wolff told me I might come."
Something in my face—oh, my despairing face, mother!—touched something human in the pompous automaton. He went straight into the drawing-room and gave my message. There was a basket of Easter lilies on the hall-table.
The music stopped, and almost at once on the threshold of the drawing-room a lady appeared. She was young—hardly older than I—and beautiful, dressed in soft mauve cloth. She looked at me curiously, and then said suddenly:
"Will you come in?"
I went into the large, luxurious drawing-room. Titian's "Bella" looked down at me blandly with her reddened eyelids.
"What message was that you sent?" she asked, with her graceful head on one side.
My voice had almost left me. "I said Hugo Wolff told me to come in. I heard you singing 'Der Musikant'...."
She laughed, and said: "Are you a musician?"
I said: "No." And I thought of telling her the History of the Wolf. But I feared she might know my name, and tell the Italians in New York. And the Italo-Americano would print an article about it—and the Corriere della Sera in Milan would reprint it....
"Is there anything I can do for you?" she said.
I nodded.
"Money?" she asked softly.
I nodded.
"How much do you need?"
"Five dollars," I said.
She smiled, and said: "Is that all? I should willingly do more for a friend of Hugo Wolff's!"
She went out of the room, and closed the door behind her. She left me in my shabby clothes, in my black straw hat and my need of five dollars, in her gorgeous drawing-room, scattered with priceless ornaments in silver and gold, jewelled frames and trinkets lying all about the tables. I covered my face with my hands, and the tears rolled through my fingers. She came back a few minutes afterwards with a gold twenty-dollar piece in her hand. She gave it to me, and said, "For luck!" and added:
"Is there nothing else I can do?"
I nodded, with my eyes full of tears. "Yes!" and I looked at the piano.
She smiled and sat down. She sang for me. I know she sang her very best. She had a lovely voice.
When I went through the hall to the door two men-servants bowed me out as if I were a princess. And I went down the stairs weeping bitterly.
I went along the street, crying and not caring who saw me. Then I sat down in Madison Square. Suddenly someone came and sat beside me. A woman. I felt her eyes fixed on me for a long time, and I turned and looked at her. There, under a turquoise toque, sat the golden hair and the large face of the prairie chicken.
"How do you do, Mrs. Doyle?" I said.
"What?" She turned quickly. "How do you know my name?" And she added, frowning: "What are you crying for?"
"For love of a woman who has been kind to me," I said.
"There are lots of kind women," she answered. "I'm kind. What do you want?"
"I want you to come and talk to my husband," I said. "You know him. You met him in Monte Carlo. His name is Aldo della Rocca."
"What? Della Rocca? That lovely Italian creature? That Apollo of Belvedere? Of course I remember him. Where is he? What is he doing here?"
"Come and see," I said.
And she came up to Mrs. Schmidl's house in 28th Street.
That evening we dined with the prairie chicken, or rather, she invited herself to dine with us. She said "Poison!" when she tasted the Knödelsuppe, and "Poison!" when she tasted the Blutwurst and Kraut.She is probably a very great lady, judging by her bad behaviour.
In my heart hope opens timid eyes.
Mrs. Doyle was a very great lady. Her husband had been a political "boss"; her sister had married an English baronet; and her daughter, Marge, eighteen years old, "a mere infant," as she said, had married Herbert van Osten, the Congressman.
She was full of good ideas. "Now, you two might be the rage of New York in no time," she said, at the end of the dinner. "You are a Count, aren't you?" And she looked confidently at Aldo. "'Della Rocca'! That sounds like a Count."
"Oh yes," said Aldo, with his shining white smile, humorously remembering his grandfather's name, "Esposito," which means a foundling, and the "Della Rocca" added to it because the little Esposito had been left on a rock near Posilippo.
"Well, let me see. You must have an atelier of some kind. Ateliers are all the rage. And your wife——" Mrs. Doyle raised her sepia eyebrows and pinched her large chin pensively.
"My wife is a great poetess," said Aldo.
"Is she?" said Mrs. Doyle. "Well—let me see. She must—she must dress a little differently—red scarves and things—and look picturesque, and read her poems in salons here. Poetry is all the rage. And if it is Eyetalian, you know," she added encouragingly to Nancy, "no one will understand it. I shall discoveryou. I shall give an At Home. 'Eyetalian poetry' in a corner of the cards. That's an elegant idea!"
But Nancy was refractory. She said she would not wear red scarves, nor recite her poetry; and what was Aldo going to do in an atelier?
"Well, my dear," said Mrs. Doyle, "faces like his are not met with every day on Broadway. I don't know how it is in your country, but his looks alone are enough to make him the rage here."
Aldo nodded, looking at Nancy as if to say: "You see?"
"But what is the good of being the rage if one has nothing to live on? What are we to eat?" asked Nancy, feeling brutal and unlovely, andterre à terre.
"Oh, my dear!" exclaimed Mrs. Doyle. "If once you are the rage in a place like New York!" ... And she raised her round blue eyes to Frau Schmidl's ceiling, where languid flies walked slowly.
But Nancy assured her that it was impossible. Could she not find some work for Aldo to do?
"What work?" said Mrs. Doyle, resting an absent-minded blue gaze on the lustrous convolutions of Aldo's hair, on his white, narrow forehead, on his intense and violent eyes, and the scarlet arcuation of his vivid lips. "What work can he do?"
"Oh!" Nancy said vaguely, "what work do men do? He has been to the University and taken a degree. He has studied law, but has not practised. I am sure he could do anything. He is very clever."
"Oh yes," assented Mrs. Doyle dreamily.
She was thinking. She was thinking of something her married daughter had been saying to her that very morning. Suddenly, she got up and said good-bye. She let Aldo help her into her long turquoise coat, andfind her gloves; and then she sent him off to fetch a motor-cab. Alone with Nancy, she was about to open her large silver-net reticule when she saw Nancy's straight gaze fixed upon her. So she refrained, and kissed her instead.
"Ta-ta, Apollo," she said, shaking a fat, white-gloved hand out of the carriage window to Aldo, who stood on the side-walk, bare-headed and deferential. Then, leaning back as the carriage slid along 7th Avenue and turned into 66th Street, she mused: "He will do—he will do elegantly. Won't Marge be delighted! That will teach Bertie to sit up. Elegant idea! Bertie will have to sit up."
Bertie was not sitting up. His wife, Mrs. Doyle's daughter, was. And very straight she sat, with defiant, frizzy head and narrow lips, when she heard the front door open and close. But it was not to her husband's insubordinate footsteps. It was the indulgent swish of her mother's silken skirts that rustled slowly upwards.
Bertie's wife sprang up and opened the door.
"'Mum'? At this hour? What has happened?"
"Nothing, Marge—nothing. Is Bertie at home?" said Mrs. Doyle.
"No," and the young pink lips narrowed again. "It is only eleven o'clock at night. Why should he be at home?"
"Marge, I have an elegant idea," said Mrs. Doyle, seating herself resolutely in an armchair opposite her daughter. "I have found the very thing we need. The bo ideel, my lambkin."
When Mrs. Doyle rose to go at midnight they were both wreathed in smiles.
"You will have to be very careful, dear," said Mrs. Doyle. "Don't be rash, and unlikely, and over-generous. The wife is a stubborn creature who spells things with a capital letter: you know what I mean—Work and Art and Dignity, and all that kind of thing. She must not be rubbed up the wrong way. Besides, it will answer just as well if he does not know what he is doing."
"That's so," said her daughter. "Mum, you're a daisy."
The unsuspecting Bertie came home that night a little before one o'clock, keyed up for the usual withering sarcasm and darkling reproach. He found his wife asleep, lamb-like and dove-like, her frizzy head foundered contentedly in the pillows, a book of Gyp on the coverlet, and a mild smile—was it of indulgence or of treason?—playing on her soft half-open lips.
The next day Mrs. Doyle called on Aldo and Nancy. Anne-Marie was introduced and patted on the head, and sent down into the kitchen.
"I have a secretaryship for you," said Mrs. Doyle to Aldo. "You can start at once. Twenty dollars a week. They won't give more."
Aldo was graciously complacent, and Nancy looked anxious.
"His English is very imperfect," she said.
"Oh, the English is chiefly copying; he can do that, can't he?"
"Of course," said Aldo, frowning at Nancy.
Nancy asked for particulars, and Mrs. Doyle folded her fat hands and gave them. It was a confidential post. He was to be "secretary to her daughter"—catching Nancy's steady grey eye, Mrs. Doyle added—"'s husband, Mr. Van Osten;" and the work was chiefly of apolitical character. He would have to—er—copy speeches, and ... etcetera. He would have a study, not in the Van Osten's house, but—er—in the same street a few doors off, opposite. He was not to talk about his work, because it was of a very—er—private character.
"Mr. Van Osten is a peculiar man," added Mrs. Doyle. "But you will understand all that in time, when you get to know him. When can you start?"
"Now," said Aldo.
Mrs. Doyle laughed. "Well, I think next Monday will do. Meanwhile"—and she coughed—"the Van Ostens are very—oh, very much for appearance, you know. You had better go to Brooks and get him to rig you out. I shall drive round and speak to Brooks about you at once."
Nancy flushed and protested. "You can pay it back to me," said Mrs. Doyle. "Don't bother me so."
So Nancy flushed, and was silent; and Aldo went to Brooks, and was rigged out.
He also had some visiting-cards with "Count Aldo della Rocca" printed on them, but not his address, which was near the nigger quarter, and probably would continue to be so for a long time to come.
On the following Monday, at half-past eleven, he arrived at the Van Osten house in 66th Street. Mrs. Doyle had particularly impressed upon him that he was not to come earlier than half-past eleven. Mrs. Doyle was waiting for him in the drawing-room, and introduced him to her daughter. Mr. Van Osten was not in. The Count was to do his work alone for these first few days, as Mr. Van Osten was very busy in Washington. The two ladies had their hats on, and accompanied himacross the street to No. 59. They had a latchkey which they gave to him, and went with him to the room that was to be his study on the top-floor. It was a large, light, almost empty, room. A wide desk stood in front of the window; there were a few chairs and tables, and a half-empty book-case. On the desk was a pile of papers, newspapers, and manuscripts. A typewriting machine stood on the table.
"Oh," said Aldo blankly, "I do not know how to use a typewriter."
"Never mind," said the ladies in unison.
"We put it there in case you could," said Mrs. Doyle.
Then Mrs. Doyle showed him his work. "All this has to be copied," she said, showing him the tidy manuscript sheets. "And then you ought to make extracts from these papers."
She pointed to the newspapers—they were of the preceding week. He was to mark and cut out everything referring to the Congo, and underline with red ink Mr. Van Osten's name every time he came across it.
"And everything that Mr. Van Osten himself says has to be copied in this large book."
"Would it not be better to cut out the speeches in print and paste them in?" said Aldo.
"Oh no," said Mrs. Doyle. "He wants them copied. Doesn't he, Marjorie?"
Her daughter turned from the window and said:
"Oh yes!" She had flittering green eyes and a funny smile. Her frizzy, light hair came down to the bridge of her small freckled nose, and she had a manner of throwing back her head in order to look from under her hair that was peculiar to her. She was dressed like an expensive French doll.
"Oh yes," she repeated, with her head thrown back, and in her high childish voice. "I guess he wants it all copied." Her smile flickered, and she turned to the window again.
The ladies left him, and he sat down to work. He copied steadily in his beautifulcommis voyageurhandwriting until two o'clock. Then he went out and had a hasty lunch. At four o'clock Mrs. Doyle rustled in and asked him how he was getting on. He was getting on splendidly. At six he went home.
This went on for three days, and on Wednesday afternoon he had nothing left to copy, or to cut out, or to paste in. He looked out of the window. He took a book from the book-case—they were almost all French novels. After reading an hour, he decided to go across to No. 8, the Van Ostens' house, and ask for instructions. He had not yet seen his employer, and, as all men who are sure of their tailor and their physique, he liked new acquaintances.
The butler who opened the door looked at his clothes, then took his hat, and divested him of his overcoat. He presented a silver tray, on which Aldo, after a moment's hesitation, deposited his visiting-card. The man looked at it, opened the drawing-room door, and pronounced: "Count Aldo della Rocca." A subdued sound of voices and tea-cups subsided into silence, and Aldo entered the room.
He bowed low, his secretary bow, standing at the door, for he did not want to offend his employers. When he raised his head, Mrs. Van Osten's light green flitter of a smile was greeting him from the sofa. His quick eye saw that she was nervous. She put out her hand and said:
"Oh, Count della Rocca, how do you do? Just in time for a cup of tea."
He stepped past the four or five ladies and an old gentleman who sat near her, and kissed her hand in Southern fashion. He was not to be the secretary?Benissimo!He was not the secretary. He was the Count.
"But perhaps," continued his hostess, "you don't like tea? Vermouth or Campari is what you take in your country at this hour, is it not?" And she held out a cup of tea to him, with her head thrown back and slightly on one side.
"Oh, Madame! All what is taken from so fair a lady's hand is nectar!" said Aldo, with his best smile; and the ladies tittered approval.
"Ah, Latin flattery, Count," said his hostess, and introduced him to her friends.
Once or twice he noticed that she glanced anxiously at him, as if dreading what he might do or say; but Aldo, remembering the political and private character of his work, did not mention it. The ladies left one by one. And the old gentleman left. Then Mrs. Van Osten turned her little dry, hard face to Aldo.
"Why did you come?" she asked.
"I have finished my work," said Aldo, feeling himself very much the secretary again. "I knew not what I was to do."
"Oh, I see. I will tell my mother—I mean my husband—about it." And at this moment Mrs. Doyle entered. Her daughter drew her to the window, and spoke to her in a whisper for some time. Mrs. Doyle replied: "Oh, all the better. I did not know how we should ever begin it." She turned to Aldo, standing stiff and secretarial in the middle of the room.
"I am glad you took Mrs. Van Osten's cue," she said. Aldo wondered what "cue" meant, but did not ask. "Do so, always. It is of the greatest importance. And now about Mr. Van Osten.Neverspeak to him about your work. He does not like it. Unless he mentions it to you, never speak about it at all. Let him see that you are absolutely discreet. Now you may stay till he comes."
He stayed and made flat general conversation. Mrs. Van Osten looked bored. Mrs. Doyle answered him nervously and absentmindedly.
The bell rang loud, and the butler opened the hall-door to admit his master. Aldo stood up. Suddenly he felt a hand on his sleeve. It was little Mrs. Van Osten's jewelled hand that pulled him down into his chair. She leaned forward, with her chin on her hand, and smiled.
"I am sure you are musical," she said, smiling into his eyes, as through the open door Mr. Van Osten entered, large, leisurely, and good-looking.
"Hulloa!" he said to his wife. "Well, mother?" to Mrs. Doyle. Then he looked at Aldo, who very slowly, wondering what he was to do, got up from his seat.
"Bertie," said his wife, looking up at him with a look that was at once the look of a cat and of a mouse, "this is Count della Rocca whom I was telling you about."
Van Osten put out his large hand. "Glad to meet you," he said. Then Mrs. Doyle sat down and talked to him.
"You are musical?" said Mrs. Van Osten, lifting her small chin, and twinkling her eyes at Aldo.
Aldo suddenly remembered what Dr. Fioretti, a friend of Nino's who had travelled in England and the United States, used to say about American women. He seemedto hear Fioretti speaking in his impressive manner, as if each word he said were three times underlined: "I tell you this about the American woman: as man and as doctor, my dear friend...." And Aldo decided that Fioretti was right.
He found himself seated at the piano, while his hostess's tiny figure was thrown forward listening to him with rapt attention. Suddenly—while her husband was laughing loud at something Mrs. Doyle had said—she put out her hand and said: "Good-bye. Come next Saturday. Now go. Go quick." And he rose and took his leave.
He described his visit to Nancy, who was so much astonished that he thought it wise to omit the reference to next Saturday. On the following morning another pile of papers lay on the desk for him, and he worked on conscientiously. On Saturday a mauve envelope containing twenty dollars was placed on the top of his papers; and on a slip of paper was written: "Come at six."
At six he went to No. 8, and found Mrs. Van Osten alone. She scarcely spoke to him until her husband came in. Then she seemed suddenly to wake up, and was all smiles and pretty gestures; when Aldo spoke to her she drooped her lashes and played with her long chiffon scarf. He left her a little later, feeling dense and bewildered.
A fortnight afterwards he was invited to dinner. "I am sure Van Osten feels that he can trust me now," said Aldo to Nancy, adjusting a faultless tie at the summit of an impeccable shirt-front. "And to-day he will probably speak to me of our work."
"I am afraid Anne-Marie is going to have measles," said Nancy, sitting drearily on the old green armchair,while Anne-Marie pulled some of the stuffing out of it with languid feverish hand. "Seventh Avenue is full of it."
"It is a beastly neighbourhood," said Aldo, buttoning his waistcoat, and fixing a sham gold chain into his watch-pocket with a safety-pin. "We must get out of it as soon as we can."
"Did those people you met at Mrs. Van Osten's ask where we lived?" asked Nancy.
"Yes. And on the spur of the moment I said Number 59 in the same street. That is where the office is, you know. I hope they won't make inquiries."
Nancy sighed. Aldo kissed her, and carefully patted Anne-Marie, who had dirty hands and a tearful face. Then he ran down and got on a car that took him up town.
No reference was made during dinner to politics or to the work. There were a dozen people present, and once—to try him, Aldo felt it!—his host said, looking straight at him: "And what are you doing in New York, Mr. Della Rocca?"
With the corner of his eye Aldo had seen Mrs. Van Osten's small head start up like a disturbed snake at the end of the table. He answered imperturbably, looking Van Osten in the face:
"Some literary work. I find itvery interesting."
He said this markedly, and Van Osten only said: "Oh, indeed?" But Aldo knew that he was pleased. Van Osten must now indeed feel that Aldo was absolutely discreet and intelligent.
After dinner, when the men joined the ladies in the drawing-room, Mrs. Van Osten called him to her with her eyes. He sat down at her side, and talked aboutItaly. She drooped her head as if she were blushing, and he wondered why. He glanced round, and saw that her husband was looking at her.
A tall thin woman stood near him, and Aldo heard her say: "What a splendid-looking man! Quite like that Somebody's Hyperion in that—er—what-do-you-call-it gallery."
"Yes," said Van Osten. "Nice sleek animal." And he continued to look at his wife.
To Aldo's astonishment, she suddenly smiled and put her hand into his own, palm upwards. He felt the little chilly hand trembling lightly on his. Her words were as astonishing as her gesture. She said:
"Well, then, Count Aldo, if you insist, tell my fortune."
He had not insisted; but he told her fortune, following the little crinkly lines in her palm with the light touch of his forefinger. She shivered and she laughed, and she threw her head back.
Van Osten sauntered up to them with his hands in his pockets; he looked large and powerful. Aldo felt like a fool, with the little chilly hand still lying in his. He went on, however: "This is the line of the intellect—" Van Osten laid his hand casually on his wife's slim shoulder, and kept it there. She glanced up at him, and again in her eyes was the look of a cat, and also of a mouse.
"... That is what I read in this hand," continued Aldo.
Van Osten moved and put forward a large patent-leather shoe. "And what is it you read in this foot?" he said. "Kicks?"
His wife burst into a ripple of laughter and withdrew her hand from Aldo's. Aldo also was much amused.The only one who did not seem to find the joke funny was Van Osten himself.
A few days later in the study, when Aldo had copied four columns out of a newspaper, he leaned back in his chair. He was irritated and tired. There was not enough ink in the inkstand, and he had to dip in his pen at every second word. He felt exasperated and on edge. Little Mrs. Van Osten was getting on his nerves. What did she mean? What did she want? She was in love with him, of course. That was not surprising. But what was surprising was her behaviour when they were alone. Either she left the room at once, or she looked at him with green, far-away, wintry eyes as if he were a wall or a window.
The night after the dinner-party he had been greatly agitated. This woman loved him. This very wealthy woman seemed to be willing to compromise herself for his sake. What should he do? For a moment the thought of running away with her crossed his mind. She was a plain little thing, but enormously rich. He might be able to be of more solid use to Nancy and his child by such a step than by slaving for them thirty years at twenty dollars a week. In a year perhaps, he might be able to return to Nancy, comfortably well off. These erratic American women were extravagant and generous, he knew.
He had walked home that night with his head in the clouds, dreaming of automobile trips across Europe, of staying at the best hotels and not paying any bills. He had found Frau Schmidl awake, and Nancy in tears, and Anne-Marie with the measles. He had stayed at home three days, sitting in the darkened, stuffy little room, heating malted milk and Nestlé's food on a spirit-lamp,and singing arias from grand operas to Anne-Marie, who liked nothing else.
When he had gone back to the room in 66th Street nobody had been to ask after him, and his work lay as he had left it. He had gone across to the Van Osten's house, and had heard Mrs. Van Osten say in a high treble voice: "I am not at home." And he had felt she was looking at him behind the curtains as he crossed the road.
He dipped his pen in the half-empty inkstand, and then impatiently leaned it up against a pen-box. It fell over, and was emptier than before. He looked round the room for an ink-bottle. He thought of ringing the bell, but the old servant that appeared on the rare occasions when he wanted her, had, after the first week, looked so ill-tempered that he dreaded asking for anything. He looked about, and opened drawers and closets. In a cupboard in the wall, on the top shelf, pushed far back, he saw a packet of papers which he seemed to recognize. He pulled them out and looked. It was his work of the week before—182 pages, neatly written. What were they doing up there?
He gazed at them for a long time; then he put them back. He resolved to make an experiment. He rang the bell, and asked the untipped and unamiable old servant to bring him some ink.
When he had a full inkstand before him, he dipped in his pen and wrote: "The debate concluded with the usual majority for the Government. La donna è mobile qual piuma al vento. I wonder whether anyone will notice that I am writing rubbish. Sul mare luccica l'astro d'argento Santa Lucia, Santa Lucia."
He finished the page, and put it on the others. Thenhe smoked cigarettes, and read "Autour du Mariage" until it was lunch-time. While he was at lunch a note was left for him.
"Come this evening at eight, sharp."
His finished sheets had been taken away as usual, and a new pile placed on the desk for him to copy. He went to the cupboard in the wall, and looked on the top shelf. Yes; the pile of papers at the back was larger. He pulled it out; on the top lay the page with the jumble of Italian words on it. He took a little heap of the sheets at random from the pile, placed them on his desk, and left them there. Then he lay back in his chair, and reflected.
For three weeks he had been copying things out of old newspapers seven hours a day. He had been paid twenty dollars a week for it. Why? Was Mrs. Doyle a charitable angel who wished to help him and his family without being thanked? No. He felt that was not it. His eye fell on the note. "Come this evening." A light went up in his mind as he recognized the fact that he was paid for the hours he spent in No. 8, not for those he passed in No. 59.
It probably meant that Mrs. Van Osten loved him, and must see him when she wanted to. The work was but a pretext to keep him near her, within call, away from others, perhaps. "Poor little woman!" he said. "How she must suffer!" Then he reflected that twenty dollars a week was not much.
At a quarter past eight that evening he turned into 66th Street, and crossed Mr. Van Osten, who had just come out of his house. Aldo saluted him respectfully, but Van Osten stood still and lit his cigar without appearing to notice the greeting.
He found Mrs. Van Osten alone, bare-shouldered, in black and diamonds. She was agitated and angry.
"You are late!" she cried.
"Forgive!" he said, kissing her hand.
She dragged it from him. "Did you meet my husband?"
"Yes," said Aldo.
"Did he see you?"
"Yes."
"Are you sure? Are you sure?" And she breathed quickly.
"Yes."
"He saw you? He saw you coming here and did not turn back——?" She stopped, and the narrow lips closed tightly. Aldo looked at her, and thought her positively ugly. She looked like a small, tight, thin, crumpled edition of Mrs. Doyle.
"Little young prairie-chicken," said Aldo to himself. But the butler came in with the coffee on a large silver tray, and the under-butler followed with the cream and sugar on another large silver tray. And the riches, the atmosphere of calm, powerful wealth, overcame Aldo's soul; his senses swam in satisfaction, and he felt that, however thin and small and crumpled she might be, he yet could return the prairie-chicken's love.
When the servants had left the room Aldo felt that he ought to speak. After a while he remembered what, once or twice, he had done with acceptable success in Italy when alone with a comparatively unknown woman. In a low voice he said:
"What is your name?"
Mrs. Van Osten raised glassy eyes. He repeated: "I do not yet know your name."
She took a sip of coffee, and said, very slowly and very clearly:
"Mrs.—Van—Osten."
"No—not that name," he said. "Your own name—your little name——"
There was a slight noise in the hall, and the outer door closed. Mrs. Van Osten heard it, and answered Aldo quickly with excited eyes.
"Marjory," she said.
Aldo bent forward over his coffee-cup. "Marjory?" he repeated softly.
It succeeded. It succeeded far better than he had expected, or than it usually did.
"Say it again!" she said quickly. "I like to hear it. Say it again. Quick!"
"Marjory!" exclaimed Aldo, bending nearer, just as the door opened and her husband came in.
She turned to him at once. "Oh, Bertie! You have come back?" and she laughed. Aldo looked at her. There was something in her voice and in her laugh that he knew. He had heard it in women's voices before. It was love. And love was in her eyes as she raised them to her husband's frowning face.
Then Aldo understood what he was there for. And more than ever, as he looked at Mr. Van Osten's powerful frame, did he realize that twenty dollars was little.
He stayed only a short time, during which he was sad, and silent, and bitter. And Mrs. Van Osten was pleased with his attitude. As he took his leave, he suddenly decided to show her that he had understood.
"Would you honour me by seeing 'Tannhäuser' from my box at the opera to-morrow night?"
A gleam shot at him from Mrs. Van Osten's sly eye.Her husband laid his large hand on his wife's bare shoulder.
"We are engaged," he said.
Mrs. Van Osten put her head against his arm.
"Indeed, we are more than that, Bertie," she said, looking up at him with an enamoured and rapturous smile.
Aldo bowed and withdrew.
The next day was Saturday. On his desk lay the mauve envelope, and in it was a hundred-dollar bill.
"I shall not need you now for a month or two, I believe," said Mrs. Van Osten wistfully. She had come over to his "office" early on the Monday morning. "But"—and she sighed deeply—"I do not suppose the effect you have had upon my husband will last for ever."
"Nothing does last for ever," said Aldo sententiously, seated before his desk.
"Then I shall send for you to come to the house again. Meanwhile, you might hang round a little in a general way," said Mrs. Van Osten. "You can send me flowers if you like. See that they are expensive ones. But don't come over often. If he once kicks you out, it will make everything impossible."
"Yes," said Aldo.
"Ah!" sighed Mrs. Van Osten; "why are such things necessary. Why are men such beasts?"
After a short pause Aldo spoke respectfully in a subdued voice: "May I ask whosheis?"
"You are impertinent," said Mrs. Van Osten, "but I may as well tell you. Everyone knows. It is Madeline Archer, that dancing minx. She has made half the wives in New York miserable!"
Aldo made a little sympathizing, clucking sound withhis tongue. Meanwhile his thoughts were quick and definite.
"If," he said, as she rose to go, "any friend of yours, one of the wives you have just mentioned, wanted—er—would like—er—thought that I could assist...."
"Oh!" cried Mrs. Van Osten, clasping her hands with peals of laughter, "youarea daisy! Oh, you take the pumpkin-pie! Upon my word! You are the greatest ever!" And she laughed and laughed, rocking to and fro.
Aldo laughed too, glad to think he was so funny.
"Before you know where you are, you'll be opening a bureau—'First Aid for Neglected Wives.' 'Perfect jealousy-arouser of the careless or the cooling husband. Diploma. References. Moderate tariff. Success guaranteed.'"
"Good idea!" said Aldo, laughing. And in a way he meant it.
She stopped laughing suddenly. "You won't turn out to be a blackmailer, will you?"
"No," said Aldo, looking at her straight from out of his beautiful eyes.
"I believe you," she said, putting out her hand. "Besides, Mum, who knows a thing or two about human nature, said that you were a good, soft old thing. And now," she added, with solemnity, "for what you have done for me, and the way you've scared Bertie into good behaviour, you may give me a kiss."
She put up her narrow mouth, and Aldo, laughing a little, kissed it.
" ... I'm glad I have kissed a Count," said Mrs. Van Osten, as she went down the stairs.
It was a bright autumn day when Valeria in Milan received Nancy's letter from New York, telling her about those first weeks of misery.
Valeria had an income of two hundred francs a month, which Uncle Giacomo, who kept her securities for her, paid to her punctually; and which she as punctually paid over to Aunt Carlotta for her board and lodging, reserving apologetically thirty or forty francs for her own small needs. On the day the letter arrived, Valeria locked herself in her room, and went on her knees before Guido Reni's gipsy-faced Madonna. The Madonna must help Nancy. She, Valeria, must help Nancy.
Uncle Giacomo would give nothing that might fall into Aldo's hands; Carlo less than nothing; he would only reproach and recriminate. As for Nino, he had nothing to give. Aunt Carlotta would possibly lend five hundred francs with great difficulty and many warnings. So Valeria decided that she would raise some money from her own investments, and arrange to have a smaller income for a few years. Nancy must have money. So Valeria put on her hat and her black silk bolero coat with the lace jabot down the front, and brown kid gloves, and went out to face a stormy interview with Zio Giacomo.
The interview was stormy. Giacomo's temper shortened with his breath, and Valeria was wrung with anguish lest his anger should harm him, and was rent with remorse when she had succeeded in obtaining what she wanted. She would not say what the money was for, because she knew that Zio Giacomo would oppose it, so she was mysterious and wilful, hinted at tragic possibilities, wept and warned, and finally left Zio Giacomo convinced that she had got herself into some serious financial scrape. "Ah, these silly women," said Zio Giacomo, watching Valeria tripping across the road, holding her violet leather handbag, her umbrella and her long skirts in confused hands. At one moment she was right under a horse's nose, but the driver pulled up suddenly, and the swerving carriage went on, carrying on its box a red-faced, head-shaking, remark-making, driver. "Silly women!" said Uncle Giacomo again, and returned wrathfully to his desk.
Valeria went to a bank, where, after much confusionary explanation, and a quarter of an hour's waiting, she emerged with five thousand francs, and some silver and pence. Her violet bag was fat with it all. "Now," said Valeria to herself, "I will go to Cook's in the Via Manzoni, and change it into American money. Or perhaps they can send it over in some other way." Then she went along Piazza del Duomo, thinking of Nancy. Poor, penniless Nancy! Poor little helpless mother of the still more helpless Anne-Marie! "I wish Tom were here to look after us all!" she said, stepping off the pavement to cross into Via Manzoni.
If Tom had been there he would have stopped her. He would have caught hold of her elbow, in the masterful way he always did when they crossed a street together, saying: "Wait a minute." Tom would have seen the tram-car coming rapidly from the right, and a carriage driving up from the left, and behind the carriage—oh, quite a distance off—a motor coming along smoothly and quickly. But Tom, or what was left of Tom, lay in Nervi with folded hands, and nobody told Valeria to wait a minute. So she stepped lightly off the pavement,holding her violet bag tightly in one hand, and her umbrella and her skirts in the other. She saw the tram-car coming from the right on the far side of the street, and thought she would run across and pass in front of it. She ran two steps, and then saw the carriage close to her, coming from the left. It was impossible to cross before it, so she stepped back quickly, very quickly, and the carriage passed. The driver's face was turned to her: was that anger in his face? What a mad, terrible face! He was screaming and gesticulating. What tempers people had in Italy, thought Valeria, for thought is rapid.... Then something struck her in the back, and she thought no more. A moment's maddening roar and clamour and confusion, then utter stillness.
... Valeria felt a cadenced, gently oscillating movement, and opened her eyes. She could see nothing. A grey linen roof was above her, grey linen walls around her. Ah, the walls undulated, parted slightly, and let some light through. Valeria could see parts of shops, and of houses, and people passing.... She was being carried through the streets. What was the matter with her mouth? She raised her hand in its brown kid glove and touched her mouth, and down along one side of it where she felt something unusual; her glove seemed not to touch her cheek but her teeth; then something hot and viscid ran into the palm of her hand and down her arm. A hand—was it hers?—fell on her breast. Suddenly she remembered her violet bag, fat with money. Where was it? She tried to say, "Where is it? Where is it? It is Nancy's." She cried it out loud, but could hear only a muffled bubbling and blowing through her mouth. Then oblivion.
... Now she was in a small, light room. Everything round her was light and white; she saw the ceiling first. It was of glass—white frosted glass. Everything was white; the people were white, except their faces, which looked dark and yellow over their white clothes. One of the faces looked at her very near, then another. Then a lighter face came with white wings round its head. Valeria knew what that was, but could not remember. She thought she would smile at that face, and did so, but the face did not smile back. It continued looking at her closely, and she felt a hand touch her forehead and smooth back her hair.
Another face came, red, with bloodshot eyes, and someone took hold of her head and turned it. A voice said: "Useless. But we can try." Then a sound of running water. Valeria put out her hand to stop it. Immediately the winged face was bending over her. "Yes, dear? Yes, dear?" Valeria thought she told her to stop the running water. But the winged face only nodded and smiled, and said: "That is a good, brave dear! We shall soon be better—soon be better." Another face and a voice: "Shall I wash this?" Then something gushed over Valeria's cheek and trickled, warm and salt, down her throat. Something choked. Then there was a pain, a pain somewhere in the room, a burning, maddening pain. A man's voice said: "Leave alone. That's no use. Look at this." Valeria's head was turned round again, and she heard a crepitant sound as if her hair were being cut. Running water again.... Valeria's head lay sideways, and she could see the white-gowned back of a man washing his hands under a silver tap. She liked watching him. He turned round, shaking his wet hands in the air with his sleeves rolled back.It was he who had the red face and the bloodshot eyes, and a clipped grey moustache. He nodded to Valeria as he saw her eyes open, and said: "That's good, that's right. A little patience." Valeria smiled at him; she felt that her mouth did not move, so she blinked with her eyes, and the red face nodded back in friendly manner.
Someone held her wrist, and for a while everything was silent. Again, again, a shooting, maddening pain. An exclamation, and then a word: "Useless." Valeria opened her eyes. She saw the white-winged woman's face with her eyes fixed on the red face, which was bending forward, and the two other faces were also bending over, looking down at something Valeria could not see, for it was on her own pillow. Then the red-faced man said: "Useless," again. And the white-winged face moved its lips.
"Useless!" The word conveyed nothing clear to Valeria's mind, but something in her body responded to the word. Thump, thump, thump, her heart began to beat, loud and quick, louder and quicker, until it could be heard all over the room. Thump, thump, thump, it rolled like a drum, and Valeria turned her frightened eyes to the red face above her. She said to him: "Stop my heart. Stop my heart from beating like this." But the three men and the sister did not seem to hear. They stood quite still listening to it, and then Valeria knew that she had not spoken. Thud, thump; thud, thump; quicker and quicker, and Valeria's eyes rolled wildly, imploring help. Then the Sister said to the surgeon: "Oh, try! try, poor thing!" And again water rushed, and something was rolled stridently across the marble floor.
"Ether," said the surgeon.
One of the yellow faces bent over her, and he had a dark net mask in his hand. He held it over her face.
Suddenly Valeria was wide awake. She sat up with a shriek, and struck out at the yellow face and the mask. She saw the two doctors and the old surgeon, and the Sister of Charity. She spoke and her voice came. She wanted to say: "Save me! Save me!" but she heard herself saying: "I have time to cross!" Then she tried to explain about the violet bag, and the money, but what she cried was: "Nancy! Nancy!" Then the surgeon was angry with the man who held the mask, and turned on him with impatient words. But the Sister stood over Valeria, and made the sign of the cross above her. "Lie down, dear, lie down," she said. So Valeria lay down.
Thud, thump; thud, thump; thud, thump, rolled the drum of her heart.
"Now," said the surgeon, "you must be good. Don't move! Count! Count to twenty."
Valeria struggled to get up. The black mask was near her face again.
"Now, dear, now!" said the Sister's voice. "Count: one—two—three——"
"Breathe deeply," said someone, and Valeria did as she was told.
Then she remembered that she was to count. But she had lost time, so she felt she must begin further on. "... Nine," she said, breathing deeply; "ten." She was on a swing—a large, wild swing in the air that swung her out in the sky and back through the wide, white air. "Eleven, twelve," Valeria felt that she must say thirteen quickly because—unlucky number—"thirteen ... fourteen...."
The swing swung her out, flying through the air with a swoop and a sweep beyond all the mountains. The people around her seemed to be left far away, down in the little white room. They would never hear her voice from so far away. "FIFTEEN!" she cried, shouting loud, loud, from afar. Then the sweep of a gigantic wave swung her out into Eternity.
"I knew it was useless," said the Surgeon angrily. The face was covered, and the stretcher was wheeled away.