The Happiest Time of Their Lives Part 18

As he laid her on the bed, he glanced whimsically at the nurse and shook his head.

But she made no response, an omission which may not have meant loyalty to Dr. Crew so much as unwillingness to support Dr. Withers.

Adelaide returned to consciousness only in time to be hurried away to make room for Vincent. His long, limp figure was carried past her in the corridor. She was told that in a few hours she might see him. But she wasn't, as a matter of fact, very eager to see him. The knowledge that he was to live, the lifting of the weight of dread, was enough. The maternal strain did not mingle with her love for him; she saw no possible reward, no increased sense of possession, in his illness. On the contrary, she wanted him to stride back in one day from death to his old powerful, dominating self.

She grew to hate the hospital routine, the fixed hours, the regulated food. "These rules, these hovering women," she exclaimed, "these trays--they make me think of the nursery." But what she really hated was Vincent's submission to it all. In her heart she would have been glad to see him breaking the rules, defying the doctors, and bullying his nurses.

Before long a strong, silent antagonism grew up between her and the bright-eyed, cheerful nurse, Miss Gregory. It irritated Adelaide to gain access to her husband through other people's consent; it irritated her to see the girl's understanding of the case, and her competent arrangements for her patient's comfort. If Vincent had showed any disposition to revolt, Adelaide would have pleaded with him to submit; but as it was, she watched his docility with a scornful eye.

"That girl rules you with a rod of iron," she said one day. But even then Vincent did not rouse himself.

"She knows her business," he said admiringly.

To any other invalid Adelaide could have been a soothing visitor, could have adapted the quick turns of her mind to the relaxed attention of the sick; but, honestly enough, there seemed to her an impertinence, almost an insult, in treating Vincent in such a way. The result was that her visits were exhausting, and she knew it. And yet, she said to herself, he was ill, not insane; how could she conceal from him the happenings of every day? Vincent would be the last person to be grateful to her for that.

She saw him one day grow pale; his eyes began to close. She had made up her mind to leave him when Miss Gregory came in, and with a quicker eye and a more active habit of mind, said at once:

"I think Mr. Farron has had enough excitement for one day."

Adelaide smiled up at the girl almost insolently.

"Is a visit from a wife an excitement?" she asked. Miss Gregory was perfectly grave.

"The greatest," she said.

Adelaide yielded to her own irritation.

"Well," she said, "I shan't stay much longer."

"It would be better if you went now, I think, Mrs. Farron."

Adelaide looked at Vincent. It was silly of him, she thought, to pretend he didn't hear. She bent over him.

"Your nurse is driving me away from you, dearest," she murmured.

He opened his eyes and took her hand.

"Come back to-morrow early--as early as you can," he said.

She never remembered his siding against her before, and she swept out into the hallway, saying to herself that it was childish to be annoyed at the whims of an invalid.

Miss Gregory had followed her.

"Mrs. Farron," she said, "do you mind my suggesting that for the present it would be better not to talk to Mr. Farron about anything that might worry him, even trifles?"

Adelaide laughed.

"You know very little of Mr. Farron," she said, "if you think he worries over trifles."

"Any one worries over trifles when he is in a nervous state."

Adelaide pa.s.sed by without answering, pa.s.sed by as if she had not heard.

The suggestion of Vincent nervously worrying over trifles was one of the most repellent pictures that had ever been presented to her imagination.

CHAPTER IX

The firm for which Wayne worked was young and small--Benson & Honaton.

They made a specialty of circularization in connection with the bond issues in which they were interested, and Wayne had charge of their "literature," as they described it. He often felt, after he had finished a report, that his work deserved the t.i.tle. A certain number of people in Wall Street disapproved of the firm's methods. Sometimes Pete thought this was because, for a young firm, they had succeeded too quickly to please the more deliberate; but sometimes in darker moments he thought there might be some justice in the idea.

During the weeks that Farron was in the hospital Pete, despite his constant availability to Mathilde, had been at work on his report on a coal property in Pennsylvania. He was extremely pleased with the thoroughness with which he had done the job. His report was not favorable. The day after it was finished, a little after three, he received word that the firm wanted to see him. He was always annoyed with himself that these messages caused his heart to beat a trifle faster. He couldn't help a.s.sociating them with former hours with his head-master or in the dean's office. Only he had respected his head-master and even the dean, whereas he was not at all sure he respected Mr. Benson and he was quite sure he did not respect Mr. Honaton.

He rose slowly from his desk, exchanging with the office boy who brought the message a long, severe look, under which something very comic lurked, though neither knew what.

"And don't miss J.B.'s socks," said the boy.

Mr. Honaton--J.B.--was considered in his office a very beautiful dresser, as indeed in some ways he was. He was a tall young man, built like a greyhound, with a small, pointed head, a long waist, and a very long throat, from which, however, the strongest, loudest voice could issue when he so desired. This was his priceless a.s.set. He was the board member, and generally admitted to be an excellent broker. It always seemed to Pete that he was a broker exactly as a beaver is a dam-builder, because nature had adapted him to that task. But outside of this one instinctive capacity he had no sense whatsoever. He rarely appeared in the office. He was met at the Broad Street entrance of the exchange at one minute to ten by a boy with the morning's orders, and sometimes he came in for a few minutes after the closing; but usually by three-fifteen he had disappeared from financial circles, and was understood to be relaxing in the higher social spheres to which he belonged. So when Pete, entering Mr. Benson's private office, saw Honaton leaning against the window-frame, with his hat-brim held against his thigh exactly like a fas.h.i.+on-plate, he knew that something of importance must be pending.

Benson, the senior member, was a very different person. He looked like a fat, white, pugnacious cat. His hair, which had turned white early, had a tendency to grow in a bang; his arms were short--so short that when he put his hands on the arms of his swing-chair he hardly bent his elbows.

He had them there now as Pete entered, and was swinging through short arcs in rather a nervous rhythm. He was of Irish parentage, and was understood to have political influence.

"Wayne," said Benson, "how would you like to go to China?"

And Honaton repeated portentously, "China," as if Benson might have made a mistake in the name of the country if he had not been at his elbow to correct him.

Wayne laughed.

"Well," he said, "I have nothing against China."

Benson outlined the situation quickly. The firm had acquired property in China not entirely through their own choice, and they wanted a thorough, clear report on it; they knew of no one--_no one_, Benson emphasized--who could do that as impartially and as well as Wayne. They would pay him a good sum and his expenses. It would take him a year, perhaps a year and a half. They named the figure. It was one that made marriage possible. They talked of the situation and the property and the demand for copper until Honaton began to look at his watch, a flat platinum watch, perfectly plain, you might have thought, until you caught a glimpse of a narrow line of brilliants along its almost imperceptible rim. His usual working day was over in half an hour.

"And when I come back, Mr. Benson?" said Wayne.

"Your place will be open for you here."

There was a pause.

"Well, what do you say?" said Honaton.

"I feel very grateful for the offer," said Pete, "but of course I can't give you an answer now."

"Why not, why not?" returned Honaton, who felt that he had given up half an hour for nothing if the thing couldn't be settled on the spot; and even Benson, Wayne noticed, began to glower.

"You could probably give us as good an answer to-day as to-morrow,"

he said.