CHAPTER III
“Cannothing be done?” Gaunt asked in a voice that was hoarse from the supreme effort made to control it.
“We have done everything possible. The issue is out of our hands,” Sir Felix Hellier answered, with the ever ready sympathy which had helped him to attain so eminent a position in his profession.
“Will she die?”
Now there was only a great despair in Gaunt’s voice. The physician looked keenly at the famous millionaire; noted the lines of suffering on his strong face, and wondered. To the world, John Gaunt was a hard man, one whose only object in life was the attainment of wealth—one who would sacrifice ruthlessly to gain that end.
Twelve months ago he had surprised every one by marrying the beauty of the season—Lady Mildred Blythe—and the general comment was that the bridegroom was moved by social ambition; while the bride wished to exchange a life of aristocratic poverty for one of unlimited wealth.
And now the wife lay on a bed of sickness, fighting for her life; while the son which she had given to her husband slumbered peacefully in an adjoining room.
“Can nothing be done?” Gaunt repeated hoarsely.
His powerful face worked painfully, and now he made no effort to hide his distress.
“I am a rich man—and——”
“Money cannot help you. The issue is in God’s hands,” Sir Felix said gravely, and turned towards the door.
“You are not going to leave her?”
“I can do no more. The nurse is quite competent.”
“Stay and I will pay you any fee you like to ask,” Gaunt cried passionately.
Sir Felix smiled slightly.
“There are patients who await me, and I may be able to help them. Here I can do no more.”
“A thousand pounds if you will stay.”
“Don’t tempt me. If I could be of the slightest use I would remain. Good-night.”
John Gaunt looked wildly at the door which had been closed so quietly. Then a deep groan came from his parched lips and he fell back heavily into an armchair.
Twelve hours ago he had been so content with his lot. Rich beyond the dreams of avarice—a beautiful wife whom he loved—and who he believed was beginning to care for him in return. How anxiously he had looked forward to the birth of their child. It was upon the coming of the babe that he had counted, to awaken in Lady Mildred’s heart a love as passionate as his own.
Now she lay a-dying, and he could do nothing to help her. In that lay the sting. His check-book was powerless and it seemed strange that it should be so. If she should die—and he would never know the love that he had sworn to arouse.
The issue lay in God’s hands.
In God’s hands, and for years the name of the Deity had never been on his lips, save as an imprecation. In the piling up of his fortune, there had been no place for religion, and he had left his youth behind him with but one determination—to amass wealth—honestly if possible—but to amass wealth. And he had succeeded beyond his most sanguine dreams. There was not a financial pie of any magnitude in which Gaunt had not a finger; and his rivals in the city gave him their unstinted admiration. No brain was as keen as his when the result of a scheme meant money, and he was not the man to allow any delicate scruple to interfere with his plans. One principle he had—one that had helped him enormously, for John Gaunt’s word was his bond, and if a bargain were once made, it would be fulfilled relentlessly, even should it result in loss. But this latter event happened very rarely.
The issue lay in God’s hands.
Could he influence His decision? His mind went back to the time when his mother, a gracious God-fearing woman, was living—his mother—who had endeavored to teach him the religion which had guided her every action until the day of her death, when he was some sixteen years of age. It had been her custom to pray with him; but her influence had not lasted very long, for Fate took Gaunt to a strange land—to the Congo—in search of fortune, and in that country and with that object, religion must be left at home. So the teaching of his mother had been forgotten.
In God’s hands!
Dare he approach Him? There was still the memory of the prayers that he had known, but there was also theblack record of the past. The scheming, the fighting, worse than that, the deliberate robbing within the scope of the law. He shuddered to remember the countless ruined lives which lay behind him in the pursuit of wealth.
Those terrible years on the Congo; the maiming and torturing of human beings; the shedding of blood to acquire wealth. With these sins on his soul could he go down on his knees and pray God to give him the life of the woman he loved?
John Gaunt was no hypocrite and he shuddered. There was not the excuse of ignorance; for as a boy he had gone to church and accepted God, only deliberately to throw Him aside when Christianity would have interfered with his ambition.
“I can’t go whining back to Him now I want something,” he said miserably.
How still everything was! There was something ghostly in the silence of the large library where he sat. Above him his wife lay battling for her life, and he could do nothing to help. Again he thought over what the famous specialist had said and he realized that in all human probability his wife was doomed.
Even now she might be dead. He rose and walked quickly up-stairs. A distant wail from the babe greeted his ears, and his lips were grimly pressed into a straight line.
The son and heir that would cost him his beloved.
Very carefully he turned the handle of his wife’s room and entered. The nurse was standing by the bed and she came to meet him.
“How is she?” he whispered hoarsely.
“No better, I am afraid.”
And he stood beside the bed where his wife lay breathing heavily. Even in that moment of agony he was struck afresh by her great beauty. Never had she been so dear to him, and he would willingly have given all that he possessed in the world to keep her with him.
Suddenly he fell on his knees and took her burning hand in his. The nurse moved away but he did not heed her. His eyes were closed, and his lips moved; but no words could be heard.
“I believe in God but I have put Him from my life. I have lived for my own ends and have committed many sins. I cannot hope that my prayer will be granted for I have done nothing to deserve any favor at Your hands.”
Formal words of prayer would not come to his unaccustomed lips. He spoke as if he were addressing some fellow being.
“But as I have done evil in my life, so I have the power of doing good. Give me the life of my wife—give her back to me—and I vow the rest of my days to Your service. I will not pretend that I can become a Christian, but I swear to You—and I keep my word—that every action of my life shall be deliberately thought out and shall be taken in accordance with the teaching of Christ. I will try to right the wrongs that I have done. Grant my request and I swear by the memory of my mother that I will keep my side of the bargain in the spirit and the letter. Should I be in doubt at any time, I will go to the best Christian that I know and I will implicitly carry out his advice.”
John Gaunt rose to his feet and there was a dazed look in his eyes. The nurse drew near and looked at him with deep sympathy.
“Her breathing seems a bit easier, sir,” she whispered.