Yet he grew quiet, and was as good as silent, when Senda, long before I began to look for her, stood unbonneted at my side in a soft glow of physical animation, her anxiety all hidden and with a pink spot on each cheek. I was startled. Had _I_ slept--or had she somehow ridden?

"Are the street-cars running already?" I asked.

"No," she murmured, producing a vial and looking for a gla.s.s. "'Tis I haf been running alreadty. Sat iss not so tiresome as to valk. Also it is safeh. I runned all se vay. Vill you sose drops drop faw me?" Her hand trembled.

I took the vial but did not meet her glance: for I was wondering if there was anything in the world she could ask of me that I would not do, and at such a time it is good for anyone as weak as I am to look at inanimate things.

"You got word to all three doctors?"

"Yes;" she gave her chin the drollest little twist--"sey are all coming --vhen sey get ready."

XXII

That is what they did; but the first who came, and the second, brought fresh courage; for the Baron--"would most likely be all right again, before the day was over"; our child was "virtually well"; and from next door-"better!" was the rapturous news. The third physician, too, was pleased with Fontenette's case, and we began at once to send the night- watchers to their rest by turns.

But there the gladness ended. At Mrs. Fontenette's bedside he asked no questions. In the parlor he said to us:

"Well, ... you've done your best; ... I've done mine; ... and it's of no use."

"Oh, Doctor!" exclaimed Mrs. Smith.

"Why, didn't you know it?" He jerked his thumb toward the sick-room. "She knows it. She told me she knew it, with her first glance."

He pondered. "I wish she were not so near _him_. If she were only in here --you see?"

Yes, we saw; the two patients would then be, on their either hand, one whole room apart, as if in two squares of a checkerboard that touch only at one corner.

"Well," he said, "we must move her at once. I'll show you how; I'll stay and help you."

It seemed more as though we helped him--a very little--as we first moved her and then took the light bedstead apart, set it up again in the parlor, and laid her in it, all without a noticeable sound, and with only great comfort of mind to her--for she knew why we did it. Then I made all haste to my own house again and had the relief to see, as Senda came toward me from her husband's room, that he had told her nothing. "Vell?" she eagerly asked.

"Well, Monsieur Fontenette is greatly improved!"

"O sat iss goodt! And se Madame; she, too, is betteh?--a little?--eh-- no-o?"

I said that what the doctor had feared, a "lesion," had taken place, and that there was no longer any hope of her life. At which she lighted up with a lovely defiance.

"Ho-o! no long-eh any hope! Yes, sare _iss_ long-er any hope! Vhere iss sat doc-toh? Sare _shall_ be hope! Kif _me_ sat patient! I can keep se vatch of mine huss-bandt at se _same_ time. He ha.s.s not a relapse! Kif me se patient! Many ossehs befo'e I haf savedt vhen hadt sose doctohs no long-eh any hope! Mine Gott! vas sare so much hope vhen she and her hussbandt mine sick hussbandt and me out of se street took in? Vill you let stay by mine hussbandt, anyhow a short vhile, one of yo' so goodt sairvants?" The instant I a.s.sented she flew down the veranda steps, through the garden, and out across the street.

I lingered a few moments with the entomologist before leaving him with others. He asked me only one question: "Hmm! Hmm! How she iss?"

"Why," said I, brightly, "I think she feels rather more comfortable than she did."

"Hmm!--Hmm!--I am sorry--Hmm!--Ach! mine Gott, I am so hoongary!--Hmm! I am so dtired mit dot sou-oup undt dose creckers!--Hmm! I vish I haf vonce a whole pifshtea-ak undt a glahss beer--hmm!"

"Hmm!" I echoed, "your subsequent marketing wouldn't cost much." I went down town on some imperative office business, came back in a cab, gave word to be called at such an hour, and lay down. But while I slept my order was countermanded and when I awakened it was once more midnight. I went to my open window and heard, through his balcony door--locked, now, and its key in my pocket--the Baron, snoring. Then I sprang into my clothes and sped across the street.

I went first around to the outer door of the dining-room, and was briefly told the best I could have hoped, of Fontenette. I returned to the front and stepped softly into what had been Mrs. Fontenette's room. Finding no one in it I waited, and when I presently heard voices in the other room, I touched its door-k.n.o.b. Mrs. Smith came out, closed the door carefully, and sank into a seat.

"It's been a n.o.ble fight!" she said, smiling up through her tears. "When the doctor came back and saw how wonderfully the--the worst--had been held off, he joined in the battle! He's been here three times since!"

"And can it be that she is going to pull through?"

My wife's face went down into her hands. "O, no--no. She's dying now-- dying in Senda's arms!"

Her ear, quicker than mine, heard some sign within and she left me. But she was back almost at once, whispering:

"She knows you're here, and says she has a message to her husband which she can give only to you."

We gazed into each other's eyes. "Go in," she said.

As I entered, Senda tenderly disengaged herself, went out, and closed the door.

I drew near in silence and she began at once to speak, bidding me take the chair Senda had left, and with a tender smile thanking me for coming.

Then she said faintly and slowly, but with an unfaltering voice, "I want you to know one or two things so that if it ever should be my husband's affliction to find out how foolish and undutiful I have been, you can tell them to him. Tell him my wrongdoing was, from first to last, almost totally--almost totally----"

"Do you mean--intangible?"

"Yes, yes, intangible. Then if he should say that the intangible part is the priceless part--the life, the beauty, the very essence of the whole matter--isn't it strange that we women are slower than men to see that-- tell him I saw it, saw it and confessed it when for his sake I was slipping away from him by stealth out of life up to my merciful Judge.

"I may not be saying these things in their right order, but--tell him I wish he'd marry again; only let him first be sure the woman loves him as truly and deeply as he is sure to love her. I find I've never truly loved him till now. If he doesn't know it don't ever tell him; but tell him I died loving him and blessing him--for the unearned glorious love he gave me all my days. That's all. That's all to him. But I would like to send one word to"--she lifted her hand--

"Across the street?" I murmured.

Her eyes said yes. "Tell _him_--you may never see the right time for it, but if you do--tell him I craved his forgiveness."

I shook my head.

"Yes--yes, tell him so; it was far the most my fault; he is such a child; such a child of nature, I mean. Tell him I said it sounds very pretty to call ourselves and each other children of nature, but we have no right to be such. The word is 'Be thou clean,' and if we are not masters of nature we can't do it. Tell him that, will you? And tell him he has nothing to grieve for; I was only a dangerous toy, and I want him to love the dear Father for taking it away from him before he had hurt himself.

"Now I am ready to go--only--that hymn those black women--in the cemetery --you remember? I've made another verse to it. You'll find it--afterward-- on a sc.r.a.p of paper between the leaves of my Bible. It isn't good poetry, of course; it's the only verse I ever composed. May I say it to you just for my--my testimony? It's this:

Yet though I have sinned, Lord, all others above, Though feeble my prayers, Lord; my tears all unseen; I'll trust in thy love, Lord; I'll trust in thy love-- O I'll trust in thy love like Mary Mahgaleen."

An exalted smile lighted her face as she sunk deeper into the pillows. She tried to speak again, but her voice failed. I bent my ear and she whispered--"Senda."

As I beckoned Senda in, Mrs. Smith motioned for me to come to her where she stood at a window whose sash she had slightly lifted; the same to which the moth had once been lured by the little puddle of sweet drink and the candle.

"Do you want to see a parable?" she whispered, and all but blinded with tears, she pointed to the lost moth lying half in, half out of the window, still beautiful but crushed; crushed with its wings full spread, not by anyone's choice, but because there are so many things in this universe that not even G.o.d can help from being as they are.

At a whispered call we turned, and Senda, in the door, herself all tears, made eager signs for us to come. The last summons had surprised even the dying. We went in noiseless haste, and found her just relaxing on Senda's arm. Yet she revived an instant; a quiver went through her frame like the dying shudder of a b.u.t.terfly, her eyes gazed appealingly into Senda's, then fixed, and our poor little t.i.tania was gone.