CHAPTER XIIITHE SPIDER AND THE FLY
Miriam Wardopened the window a little further and looked out. It was nearly midnight and the cold, raw breeze was an agreeable contrast to the atmosphere of the sick room. Mrs. Nash’s preparations for the night were long-drawn-out and Miriam had found her at her worst. In turn she waxed dictatorial, fault-finding and fretful, and Miriam’s stock of patience was severely taxed. It seemed an interminable time before Mrs. Nash finally closed her eyes with the avowed intention of taking “forty winks,” and the imperative command that she be awakened the moment her husband returned.
Miriam made herself as comfortable as possible on the window seat, having carried a sofa pillow with her, and pulling her sweater more closely over her shoulders, she leaned her head against the wooden sash and stared out into the night. The stars were out and the moonlight added beauty to the grounds. It all appeared so calm and peaceful, so utterly different from the last four hectic days.Miriam sighed involuntarily and closed her eyes. When she opened them a few minutes later she saw the powerful headlights of a car coming along the turnpike. A second later it had swung into the driveway and Miriam recognized the Rolls-Royce. The front door was toward the other side of the house, and Miriam lost sight of the car as it circled the approach to theporte cochère. Undoubtedly Doctor Nash had returned.
Miriam’s expression hardened. Her outspoken, frank disposition made it next to impossible for her to cloak her aversion even under the ordinary courtesies of the sick room. She was commencing to loathe Doctor Nash; while wondering dimly why two such opposite natures as Dora Carter and the clergyman had ever fallen in love with each other. Truly, the marriage market was but a lottery!
Leaving her position by the window, Miriam walked softly over to the bed. Her patient’s deep breathing assured her that Mrs. Nash was comfortably asleep and Miriam’s heart lightened; she would not have to summon Doctor Nash, for, in spite of his wife’s wishes, Miriam did not propose to awaken her. The closing of a door further down the hall with a resounding bang brought her hand to her heart and Mrs. Nash’s eyes unclosed in time to notice Miriam’s agitation.
“What was that noise?” she demanded. “What has happened to make you so pale?”
“Nothing—it’s the lamplight,” Miriam stammered a trifle incoherently. “A door slammed and startled me.”
Mrs. Nash rubbed her eyes and inspected her with interest. Miriam’s trig uniform was becoming.
“Nerves,” Mrs. Nash remarked caustically. “Have you seen Doctor Nash?”
“He has just returned and I believe is still downstairs,” responded Miriam. “But, Mrs. Nash, you should not see any one at this hour.”
“Tut! My nap has refreshed me, and besides, I am stronger, much stronger,” with emphasis, and she struggled into a sitting position. “Just throw that bed sacque over my shoulders and ask Doctor Nash to come here, there’s a good child!”
Miriam’s hesitation was interrupted by a low tap on the bedroom door, and walking swiftly over to it she found Doctor Roberts standing in the hall.
“I am on my way to bed,” he said, softly. “How is Mrs. Nash?”
“Her general condition is better now.” Miriam slipped outside and held the door so that their voices would not carry into the bedroom. “But when I came on duty I found her cyanosed, so I gave her stimulation and applied heat locally.”
Doctor Roberts stroked his chin thoughtfully, then moved toward the door and Miriam held it open. Mrs. Nash greeted him with a frown.
“Some more horrid medicine,” she grumbled. “Well, all paths lead to the grave.”
“A cheerful outlook,” smiled Roberts as he took her pulse. “You ought to be asleep at this hour.”
“I never felt more wakeful,” and Mrs. Nash’s alert look confirmed her words. “Where have you been all the evening?”
“At Sheriff Trenholm’s—Alan Mason and I dined with Trenholm, and your husband drove us back.”
“What was he doing there?” The look which she flashed at him startled the physician.
“He had come for Betty Carter, having missed her at the cemetery,” replied Roberts. He was commencing to feel uncomfortable under Mrs. Nash’s steady stare. Quickly he rose to forestall other questions. “We returned together a few minutes ago. Now, Mrs. Nash, it is after midnight and you must get to sleep.”
“Presently,” she retorted. “As you go to your room, Doctor, please ask Alex to come here. I shall not sleep until I have seen my husband,” and her air of finality closed the discussion. “Good night.”
Roberts smiled at her characteristic dismissal. Atthe door he turned to Miriam and signed to her to come into the hall.
“Humor her as much as possible,” he said. “When she gets her own way, she’ll go to sleep. Her pulse is better and she has no temperature. I’ll send Nash along,” and with a friendly smile he hurried downstairs.
Miriam had just given Mrs. Nash a drink of water when the clergyman came in. Mrs. Nash’s sharp, black eyes detected his constrained manner as he spoke to Miriam and her equally stiff acknowledgment of his greeting. Turning her back upon Nash, Miriam addressed his wife.
“I will wait in the alcove in the hall until your husband leaves,” she said. “If you wish anything, please let me know.”
Nash remained standing until the hall door closed behind Miriam and then he seated himself in a chair by his wife’s bed.
“I am so thankful that you are better, Dora,” he said, taking her hand in both his and raising it to his lips. “So very, very thankful to a merciful Providence.”
“Save some of your thanks for Miss Ward,” she remarked dryly. “She gave Providence a helping hand. By the way, you don’t seem to like her.”
“My dear Dora!”
“Why not?” she persisted, ignoring his interjection.
Nash sighed. Custom had taught him respect for his wife’s tenacity, but there were times when he wanted to shake her.
“She, eh—reh—has an agreeable personality,” he began. “I am grateful to her for what she has done for you, but I, eh, really, my dear, haven’t given her much thought.”
“Oh!” Nash squirmed uneasily under her unswerving gaze. “Oh!” repeated Mrs. Nash, and her intonation conveyed much or little according to her husband’s perception. “And Betty, where is she?”
The rapid change of topic confused Nash, his slower wits failing to keep up with his wife’s trend of thought. “She is downstairs,” he stated. “That is, I left her there talking to Alan and Roberts.”
“She ought to be in bed,” declared Mrs. Nash, with ill-concealed irritability. “Traipsing around the countryside by herself at night. Did she reach the cemetery?”
“Yes.” Nash cleared his throat. “The attendant at the vault told me that she had gone to Trenholm’s, two miles the other side of the cemetery; so Pierre drove me there and I brought her home.”
Mrs. Nash looked down at the old-fashioned,handmade quilt and studied its pattern and cross stitch intently.
“Betty is a great responsibility,” she said, glancing over at her husband. “Her eccentric conduct, her total lack of thought for others—”
“She is young,” broke in Nash with some vehemence and his wife changed color. “And youth is selfish.”
“If that were all—” Mrs. Nash spoke under her breath and her husband failed to catch what she said. He did not care to break the pause and, as the silence lengthened, Mrs. Nash’s thoughts reverted to the past.
Alexander Nash did not appear a day older than the first time she had met him in London two years before. The fact that he was again clean-shaven accounted for his unaltered appearance, his wife decided. She had never cared for his carefully trimmed beard and mustache which he had worn until a day or so before. A flood of memories of the days of their courtship, their marriage in Paris and their happy, happy honeymoon kept Mrs. Nash silent. A year and six months had passed since then. Mrs. Nash bit her lip.
“I am a romantic old fool,” she admitted, and her usually metallic tones had softened, holding a depthof feeling which would have startled her skeptic friends. “Kiss me, Alec.”
From where she sat in the hall Miriam caught now and then the sound of voices from the living room on the floor below, and recognized Betty’s clear tones and Roberts’ heavier bass, with now and then a word from Alan Mason. But from Mrs. Nash’s bedroom no sound issued and she waited patiently in her corner for Doctor Nash to take his departure. Footsteps on the staircase caused her to draw further back in the alcove; she was in no mood to talk to any member of the house party that night. Was “house party” the proper term when tragedy had brought them together under the same roof? With a shake of her head Miriam dismissed the question as Betty came up the steps, followed by Roberts. On reaching the second floor she paused and spoke to the physician.
“I cannot sleep,” Miriam heard her say. “Indeed, Doctor, I cannot sleep, and another night like the last three will drive me to madness. Can’t you give me something to induce sleep?”
Roberts scanned her closely. Betty’s broken voice, her quivering lips which she strove vainly to keep steady, were both unmistakable symptoms of her overwrought condition. Roberts had marveled at her self-control during their drive homeward, unexpectedlydelayed by a puncture which had taken Pierre over an hour to repair. Nash’s wrath at the chauffeur for not having a spare tire along had added a picturesque moment to the monotony of the trip. It was the first time Roberts had seen the generally self-contained clergyman give way to temper.
“Get ready for bed, Betty,” Roberts advised, “and I will ask Miss Ward to prepare a sedative.”
Betty checked him with an expressive gesture. “Can’t you give it to me?” she asked. “I—I dislike to—to ask Miss Ward for—for—to do anything,” she spoke through chattering teeth. “I believe I am having a chill.”
Roberts laid a firm hand on her arm. “Come,” he said in tones which his patients rarely disobeyed. “Go immediately to bed. I will find Miss Ward to assist you; now, no nonsense,” as she paused to voice another objection. “Go.”
Miriam emerged from the alcove as Roberts, after conducting Betty to her bedroom door, came down the hall.
“Doctor Nash is with his wife,” she explained. “I have been sitting yonder and could not help but overhear your conversation with Miss Carter.”
“She is on the point of a breakdown,” Roberts said tersely. “Is your hypodermic ready for use?”
“Yes, Doctor.”
“Then please come to Miss Carter’s bedroom: I will meet you there in a few minutes,” and taking her acquiescence for granted Roberts hurried to his own room where he had left his bag.
Miriam paused in indecision; she had been trained to serve humanity—to care for the sick and to look after the infirm. Was it obligatory upon her to minister to Betty now that she was ill? No, a thousand times, no! From somewhere came the chimes of a clock—one in the morning—Doctor Roberts was powerless to secure other aid in a sick room at that hour and twenty miles from Washington. Miriam walked quietly to her room, where she had her hypodermic syringe, secured it and went direct to Betty. Alexander Nash would find her if she was needed by his wife.
Betty looked up at her approach and Miriam was struck by the suffering in her face. In her haste to undress and get into bed she had scattered her clothes on the floor and she had kept on her dressing gown.
“It—it’s very good of you,” she murmured. “I—I—” she paused, at a loss for words.
“Doctor Roberts will be here in a moment,” answered Miriam quietly. Putting down her hypodermic, she spent the next few minutes arranging the room and adjusting the windows. Betty nevertook her eyes from her and Miriam was thankful when Roberts knocked on the closed door.
Silently Miriam aided him in his examination and her swift deftness won his admiration. As he took the thermometer from Betty Miriam observed a gold chain suspended about her neck. She caught Miriam’s glance and drew her dressing gown close about her throat.
Miriam prepared the hypodermic, then paused by Roberts’ side. “Will you give it?” she said simply, holding the instrument toward the physician, and Roberts grasped her reluctance to administer the opiate.
No one in the room was aware that the door had been cautiously opened an inch or two and then as quietly closed. Alan Mason reached the staircase a minute later and stood listening, his head bent. Only the faint tick-tock of the grandfather clock was to be heard. Convinced that he was alone in the hall he made his way noiselessly to the door of the room where Paul Abbott’s body had lain until the funeral that afternoon. The door was locked. Alan drew in his breath sharply, hitched at his dark sweater, and glanced down at his “sneakers”; then he crept softly through the darkness of the back hall and disappeared.
Roberts looked over at Miriam and then at Bettyas he rose and tiptoed to the door. “She will be all right, now,” he said. “If you have an opportunity, come in again during the night.” He paused and, to Miriam’s surprise, held out his hand. “Thank you. Good night.”
Miriam delayed only a few seconds to adjust the light so that it would not shine directly in Betty’s eyes and awaken her, and then she left the room. She had almost reached her old seat in the alcove, and was debating in her mind whether or not to go at once into Mrs. Nash’s room, when her patient’s door swung open and Doctor Nash appeared in the hall. He looked relieved to find her there.
“I waited until my wife dropped asleep,” he said. “You can go in now, but pray don’t disturb her.”
Miriam bit her lip to keep back a heated rejoinder. Instructions in nursing from members of the patient’s family, irrespective as to who they were, were generally infuriating, but, from Alexander Nash, doubly so. He evidently expected no answer, for turning abruptly, he sought his bedroom.
Nash had not only lowered the lamp before leaving his wife, but had placed a screen about it—however Miriam’s familiarity with the room enabled her to move about without colliding with the furniture. The cot did not appeal to her—she felt, as she had once expressed it to a fellow student atthe hospital when in training, too “twitchy” to lie down. Going over to the chair which Nash had occupied, she sat down in it. It was not the one which customarily stood near the bed, but another chair, bigger and much lower, and Miriam experienced a sense of sudden shock as she dropped down further than she had expected.
It was a chair built for a large man and Miriam felt lost in its depths and squirmed back, hoping to find an easier position, but that made her stretch her legs before her at an uncomfortable angle. Too tired to get up, she put her hand behind her and pulled up the seat cushion. As she did so, she touched a paper—evidently a letter, she judged, as she ran her fingers over what was unmistakably an envelope with stamps upon it. Half rising she turned around and bending down saw that a letter was wedged between the high, tufted cushion and the upholstered back of the chair. In idle curiosity, Miriam took it up, replaced the cushion, and carried the letter over to the lamp. The orange Canadian stamps caught her attention instantly. She turned it over. The black seal was unbroken, the flap uncut—the letter evidently never had been opened.
Miriam drew a long, long breath. Turning, she gazed at the chair. Its unwieldy size had induced her to push it behind the bedroom door the first nightof Mrs. Nash’s illness, to get it out of the way. Evidently Doctor Nash had preferred it to the one in which she generally sat, and had moved it up to the bed. Had he accidentally dropped the letter in the chair and not perceived it when leaving the darkened room? Miriam consulted the postmark and then the address. It bore Paul Abbott’s name and was dated January 23, 1923.
Miriam stood in deep thought holding the unopened letter, then she slipped it inside her uniform, made sure that it was safe, and, crossing the room, seated herself once more by Mrs. Nash, her mind in a turmoil.
It was close upon three o’clock in the morning when Mrs. Nash awoke and called Miriam by name.
“I am so thirsty,” she complained, as the girl bent over her. “Couldn’t I have some orange juice?”
“Certainly,” and Miriam went over to the table on which she kept her supplies. The oranges were there, but hunt as she might, she could find no knife. With a few uncomplimentary comments on Martha’s carelessness in neglecting to bring her one when she carried her night lunch upstairs, Miriam hastened down to the pantry, after a brief word of explanation to Mrs. Nash.
Mrs. Nash could see from her position in the bed the hall door which Miriam had left ajar; fromthere her gaze shifted to the lighted lamp at the farther end of the room, and then she closed her eyes. When she opened them the bedroom was in darkness.
As Mrs. Nash lay speechless with surprise, she grew conscious that some one beside herself was in the room, and a faint, scraping noise sounded closer and closer to the bed. Suddenly something soft brushed across the back of her hand lying on the edge of her bed. Turning her hand over with lightning speed, her fingers closed spasmodically upon some object, and a cry escaped her.
Miriam, halfway up the stairs, covered the distance to her bedroom with flying feet as the low cry came to her ears. She faltered in consternation at sight of the utter darkness. Mrs. Nash caught sight of her white uniform as she stood in the doorway, outlined by the light behind her in the hall.
“Bring in the lamp,” she directed, unaware that her voice was hoarse from excitement, and Miriam obeyed her instantly. When she reached the bedside, Mrs. Nash was leaning upon her elbow, a false beard suspended from her hand.
“I almost got him,” she exclaimed in triumph, then fainted quietly away.