CHAPTER XXXVII.SUSPENSE.
Oh, weary struggle! Silent tearsTell seemingly no doubtful tale;And yet they leave it short, and fearsAnd hopes are strong and will prevail.My calmest fate escapes not pain;And, feeling that the hope is vain,I think that he will come again.—Wordsworth.
Oh, weary struggle! Silent tearsTell seemingly no doubtful tale;And yet they leave it short, and fearsAnd hopes are strong and will prevail.My calmest fate escapes not pain;And, feeling that the hope is vain,I think that he will come again.—Wordsworth.
Oh, weary struggle! Silent tearsTell seemingly no doubtful tale;And yet they leave it short, and fearsAnd hopes are strong and will prevail.My calmest fate escapes not pain;And, feeling that the hope is vain,I think that he will come again.—Wordsworth.
Oh, weary struggle! Silent tears
Tell seemingly no doubtful tale;
And yet they leave it short, and fears
And hopes are strong and will prevail.
My calmest fate escapes not pain;
And, feeling that the hope is vain,
I think that he will come again.—Wordsworth.
At daylight Pina awoke. Finding her mistress still sleeping heavily under the influence of the sedative, she arose and replenished the fire and then went down stairs and got her own breakfast.
After which she prepared some very strong coffee and some delicate milk toast, and took it up to the lady’s chamber and set it upon the hearth to be kept warm until her mistress should awake.
But with the hapless young wife the awakening was but the return to anguish.
With great difficulty Pina prevailed on her to take a little food. There was but one argument the girl could successfully use with the expectant mother—her child. To keep up her strength for its sake, Drusilla tried to eat and drink, though even the coffee and the soft toast seemed to choke her in her effort to swallow them.
After this little repast she fell back upon her pillow, too spirit-broken to wish to leave her bed.
Pina opened the front windows to let in the cheerful light of the golden autumn morning; and then she took the breakfast tray down into the kitchen.
Leo was sitting there, polishing his cutlery.
“How’s mist’ess?” inquired the boy.
“It’s hard to say. I know I’d rather see her in a rale bad spell of illness, like the typus fever, or something, than this way. Her heart’s broke; that’s how she is. And I tell you what, Leo, long’s master’s done broke faith with mist’ess I don’t see how we got any call to keep faith long o’ him,” grumbled the girl.
“Broke faith with her?” echoed the boy, pausing in his work.
“Yes, that letter he writ said he wasn’t coming back no more. And that’s what’s killed her.”
“My goodness!”
“And now look here, Leo—ifhe’snot coming back to take care of her, somebody must, that is certain. I don’t know enough, although I did help mammy to bring up all my little brothers and sisters.”
“Well, what do you wantmeto do? I’ll do anything in the world for mist’ess.”
“Well, I tell you. Leo, I want you to go down to Alexdry and fetch mammy to her.”
“But good gracious me alive, that is as much as my ears are worth! Didn’t master order us not to have any followers, not even our own kin folks?”
“But I told you before, if master don’t keep faith long o’ mist’ess, we ain’t got no call to keep faith long o’ him, ’specially when it’s to rist her life.”
“Oh, if that’s the case, I’ll go at once,” answered the boy. For it was only necessary to convince him that his mistress’s safety depended on “mammy’s” arrival to make him eager to go and fetch her.
Yet just as he was about to leave the kitchen he turned and inquired;
“But isn’t better to ask mist’ess first?”
“No; she would be sure to object, though it’s for her own safety. You go and fetch mammy. And then I’ll leton to mist’ess how she come on a wisit to me, promiscuous like, and I’ll ’vise mist’ess to see mammy.”
“All right; but if you get me into a scrape for nothing, you know, Pina, it will be your own fault.”
“Just so; and I’ll be willing to bear all the blame.”
Leo went upon his errand, and Pina hurried up to her mistress’s chamber.
Drusilla had thrown herself out of bed, and was walking distractedly up and down the room, with her dark hair falling down over her white night-dress, her face pale, her eyes wild, and her fingers wreathed and wrung together in an agony of grief.
Vain were all Pina’s efforts to soothe her.
“Oh, I do but feel my trouble more and more! more and more as the hours go by! If I only could see him! If I could see him once and speak to him, he would hear me! he could not let me die before his sight,” she sobbed forth, with her eyes streaming with tears, whose fountains seemed exhaustless.
“It’s like p’isoning of her to save her life; but it’s what the doctors do, and I must do it,” said Pina, as she poured out a large dose of valerian and coaxed the sufferer to drink it.
As before, the powerful sedative quickly took effect. And Drusilla let her maid lead her to her resting chair near the window, and seat her in it, and put a foot cushion under her feet.
“There, mist’ess, sit there and be quiet. I wouldn’t lay down on the bed too much. It isn’t good for you. Sit by the window and look out at the Lord’s good sunshine. Bless you, the sun shines still, spite of all the fools and wilyuns in the world. And here, I’ll bring you your Bible and set it on your little stand before you. You used to take comfort in your Bible. Lor’! if we only lovedHimhalf as well as we do some of his onworthy creeturs weneedn’t have our hearts broke by ’em,” said Pina, as she made the arrangement she proposed. But her last sentiment was spokensotto voceand did not reach the ears of her inattentive mistress.
Instead of deriving the consolation from the sacred volume which indeed she was too much overcome to seek, Drusilla dropped her head upon its open pages and seemed to pray, or weep, in silence.
“To think, when she gets wiolent, I have to knock her down with a dose of walerian this way! It’s a most like murder. And how’s it a gwine to end? I wish mammy would come. I hope she ’aint got no engagement nowhere else,” muttered Pina to herself as she went and made up the bed.
At noon it was a work of difficulty and of diplomacy for Pina to get her mistress to swallow a few spoonfuls of the chicken broth she had prepared for her.
In the afternoon Drusilla was so much prostrated that Pina assisted her to bed, and darkened the room, that she might sleep, if possible.
Late in the evening Leo returned from Alexandria, bringing with him a middle-aged, motherly-looking colored woman, who called herself “Aunt Hector, honey,” but whom Pina rushed to embrace as “mammy.”
As soon as the overjoyed daughter had relieved her mammy of bonnet, shawl and umbrella, and had sent them by Leo with the “big box, little box, ban-box and bundle,” up to the servants’ bedrooms over the kitchen, she set about getting tea for the traveller.
She laid a cloth upon which she arranged her own best service, with cold ham, fried chicken, fresh butter, Maryland biscuits, and, lastly, a pot of fragrant imperial.
While Leo was out in the stable attending to his horses, the mother and daughter sat down to the table together.
“Now what sort of a home is this here you’ve got here,gal, where the marser is allus gone and the missus allus grievin’ day in and day out?”
“Well, mammy, you know as one follows the other; and if the master’s always gone the mist’ess is likely to be always grieving, if so be she cares for him, which our mist’ess do.”
“What’s he gone so much for? It looks bad.”
“So it do, mammy, which it is bad too.”
“But what’s he gonefor?”
“He say business—let me see—connected—yes, that’s it—with his late father’s will.”
“Um hum; allus some excuse with them men. To begin so airly, too; ‘fore he’s married a year. Lor’, I thought you was agoing to have such a happy home, living fellow sarvint with your own dear brother, long of a young married pair with the highest of wages, and no ’sideration but to live quiet and keep away company. But, deary me! who can count on anything? Well, gal, I’m glad to get leave to come to see you at last. But what can I do for you? That boy, Leo, I couldn’t get nothink out’n him, ’cept ’twas the marser was allus gone and the missus was allus grievin’, and you wanted me to come and nuss her.”
“Yes, mammy, that was it. And I hope you can stop now you are here.”
“Oh, yes, I can stop fast enough. I have just got through nussin Mrs. Porter with her fifth. And Liza Jane, she’s out of service now and stopping home with me to mend up her clothes; so she can take care of the house and chillun.”
“How is sister Liza Jane and the rest?”
“Oh, they’s well enough. All had the fever ’n agur in the airly part of the season, but when the frost came it killed it. But where’s the young madam?”
“Sleeping now, mammy. I had to give her a great big dose of walerian.”
“You—youdare to dose a lady? Look here, gal, don’t you set yourself up for a doctoress because your mammy’s one.”
“Lor’, mammy, what’s walerian? I’ve seen you give it to ladies for the hysterics by tea spoonfuls.”
“Seenme? Yes, but I tell you what, gal, you’ve got to p’izen a great many patients before you can be trusted to give physic like an ole ’oman. But don’t you try that on again, gal, I tell you.”
“Lor’, mammy, what on the yeth was I to do with her, when she was raving distracted mad a-most? a pacing up and down the room a tearing of her beautiful hair out by the roots, and wringing and a twisting of her fingers often her hands all but! I ’clare to the Lord and man I was ’fraid of my soul as she’d dash herself against a wall, or fling herself out’n the window. And nothing on yeth but walerian would quell her. That’s the reason I sent for you. I didn’t like to take the ’sponsability to keep on a knocking of her over with that there weepon; but I couldn’t let her ’stroy herself neither, so I had to give it to her, whether or no, till you came.”
“But what on the yeth did the creetur take on so about? Nothisbeing away.”
“Yes, it was, mammy. His being away and his disappointing of her by not coming back when he promised. Men is such wilyuns!”
“And wimmin is sich fools! For my part, when the chillun’s well the men may go to Old Nick for me! But she ’aint got no chillun to comfort her, poor young thing.”
“Notyet, mother,” said Pina, significantly.
“‘Not yet?’ What do you mean, gal?Soon will!”
“Yes, mammy.”
“When?”
“Don’t know exactly; neither does she; but soon; and that’s another reason why I sent for you.”
“Um hum. Well, if that’s so, she’s not to be let to go raving and tearing about, let who will come or stay away,” said the wise woman.
The abrupt entrance of Leo put an end to this part of the gossip.
The boy sat down at the table and took his tea.
“And now, mammy,” said Pina, “as it’s late and you’re tired, I’ll show you where you are to sleep.Ishall have to stop in the room with the mist’ess.”
“And mind you, don’t give her any more physic, ’out calling me fust,” said mammy, as she followed her daughter up to the little room above the kitchen.
Pina dismissed Leo to the stable loft, fastened up the house, raked out the kitchen fire, and then returned to her mistress’s chamber.
The poor little lady was in a troubled sleep, broken by fitful sighs and sobs, and muttered words of which “Alick” was the only one to be distinctly heard.
Pina just loosened her own clothes and sat down in the lounging chair by the side of the bed to watch or sleep, as the case might be. She slept, of course; and her sleep was so deep that she did not know her, mistress awoke and arose a little after midnight and paced the floor, weeping and wringing her hands, until daylight, when she fell exhausted upon the bed and dropped into a short and fitful slumber, disturbed with gasps and starts.
By sunrise Pina opened her own eyes, and seeing her mistress lying very much as she had left her when she fell asleep, the girl arose and replenished the fire and went down into the kitchen.
Here she found “mammy” making herself at home and in full blast before the range getting the breakfast.
“Well, and when am I to see the madam, I’d like to know?” inquired Aunt Hector.
“Soon’s ever she wakes, mammy; which you know youcouldn’t see her last night, ’pon account of you being tired and she sleepy.”
“How is she this morning?”
“Sleeping like an angel, which so she’s been a doing of all night.”
“Um hum, you been a giving of her more o’ that walerian!”
“Deed I aint, mammy, which she hasn’t needed of it.”
When Pina and her mother and brother had had their breakfast, the girl prepared some rich and delicate chocolate and some nice light muffins for her mistress’s morning meal, and took them up to the lady’s chamber.
Drusilla was awake, though pale and worn.
After having bathed her face and hands with diluted Florida water, she consented to take a little of the refreshments that Pina brought and sat upon a stand by her bedside.
While Drusilla sat up in bed and sipped her chocolate, Pina broached the subject of her mother’s presence in the house.
“Mist’ess, I want to tell you, ma’am, as my ole mammy has come to see me, a little bit. I hope you has nothing of no objectionnow, ma’am?”
“None in the world, Pina. Mr. Lyon——” She had nearly broken down and wept again when she pronounced his name; but she gasped, recovered herself and went on—“Mr. Lyon used to object to having even your relatives come to the house, but now that he is not here their coming or going can make no difference.”
“And you don’t object on your own account, ma’am?”
“No, Pina, no; I don’t. It is good to have your mother to come to see you. I wish, oh, how Idowish I had a mother to come to see me, in my great trouble!” she added, with a little sob.
The tears rose to Pina’s eyes, as she answered:
“My mammy is only a poor colored ’oman; but indeed, ma’am, if you will let her, she will do for you as loving and as tender as any mother.”
“Will she stay with you long, Pina!”
“She would like to stay some weeks, if you would let her, ma’am.”
“She can stay as long as she likes, for your sake, my good girl. But your mother—she must be in years, Pina?”
“She’s past fifty, ma’am, I believe.”
“Is she—experienced?”
“Beg pardon, ma’am?”
“Is she—wise, skillful, knowing, I mean, about sickness and about children?”
“Oh! yes, ma’am, which that is her perfession, brought up to it, ma’am.”
“Then I think it very providential that she is here now. Oh, I am very inexperienced and helpless! Pina, I think I should like to see your mother and have a little talk with her. When you take away this service you may bring her up.”
“Oh yes, ma’am! thank you, ma’am. She’ll be so glad to pay her ’spects to you,” said the girl, delighted that the proposal she had so much dreaded to make, had been so kindly received.
But the moment Pina left the room, Drusilla fell back upon her pillow in a storm of sobs and tears, and gasping forth at intervals:
“Oh, Alick! Alick dear, to leave me at such a time as this, and I so friendless and so ignorant, I might die! I wish I could!”
After a few moments, hearing footsteps on the stairs, she ceased sobbing, and tried to compose herself.
Pina discreetly knocked at the door.
“Wait a moment,” said Drusilla, wiping her eyes andsmothering the last convulsive throes of her bosom. And then——“Come in,” she called.
Pina entered, showing in her mother.
Drusilla turned with forced calmness to welcome the stranger.
“How do you do? What is your name?” she inquired, in a gentle tone.
“My name’s Aunt Hector, honey, ladies’ nuss, which I have recommendments to show from the head doctors, ma’am,” answered “mammy,” curtseying.
“I think it very fortunate for me that you are here. I hope you will be able to stay with me.”
“Which it is my intention so to do, long as I shall be wanted, honey, and no longer.”
“Thank you, I would like to talk with you a little. I have no mother, and I am as ignorant as a child of many things I ought to know—Pina, my good girl, you may leave the room, and you needn’t come back until you are called. I wish to speak in private to this good nurse.”
As Pina left the room and closed the door behind her, mammy turned to her patient, and said:
“I hope, ma’am, that gal does her duty, which it is always my pride and ambition to bring up my chillun so to do.”
“She is a very good girl, and pleases me perfectly.”
“I am oncommon glad to hear it, ma’am.”
“And now I wish to speak to you of——” Drusilla hesitated.
“Yes, honey, I understand. Speak out and don’t mind me. I’m an ole nuss, you know, chile.”
Thus encouraged, Drusilla began to speak of the state of her own health, of her youthful inexperience, and of her forlorn circumstances.
In doing this she tried to cover the sin of her guilty husband, by explaining his absence in the stereotyped mannerthat he himself had often used, and putting it upon the ground of “business connected with his late father’s will.”
But this effort was too much for her superficial composure. The very name of Mr. Lyon overthrew her self-control. In speaking of him her voice faltered, then she choked, gasped and broke into a violent fit of sobs and tears that shook her fragile frame almost to the point of dissolution.
The nurse was much too wise to coax or scold her patient. But the sly old fox, who had blown her daughter up for meddling with dangerous drugs, went herself and mixed a composing draught for the sufferer—and not of the harmless valerian that had been administered by Pina, but of potent morphine that in a few moments sent Drusilla into a sleep that lasted all that afternoon and night.
But, ah! when she did at length awake, on this the third morning after the great blow had fallen on her, she awoke but to the renewal of anguish intolerable; of sorrow that refused to be comforted; of despair that had forgotten the very existence of hope.