Shadows of Flames Part 36

But he said quietly the next moment:

"Sophy, the little Harding says that she'll come back here, when her mother is well enough. That being so, I want to ask you a favour."

"Yes--do!" she said eagerly.

"I want to ask you to take me in hand yourself. You have all the--the stuff." The lie choked him somehow. He hastened to correct its literalness though not its import. "I mean nurse said that she was going to turn it over to you."

"Yes--I have it," said Sophy. Why should her heart beat so? He was only asking her to do what Anne had asked her.

"Well, then, there _is_ something you can do for me--you can spare me the humiliation of having some strange wench pottering about, and bulldozing me with her dirty little professional airs and graces. If you'll take me in hand yourself, and spare me that, you'll find me amenable. Will you? Wait a moment," he added, before she could answer.

"It's only fair to give you warning that I will _not_ submit in any case to having another of these hussies round me. The Harding was bad enough, but I've got used to her--I rather like her--tough little specimen! She amuses me. But another--I'll wring her neck before I'll submit to it!

That's my last word on the subject."

Bellamy was much perturbed at this fiat of Chesney. Yet, when he had thought over it a while, realising the stubborn fixedness of the man's will and fearing to irritate him unnecessarily, he came to the conclusion that it was not so dangerous a situation as he had at first thought. He could trust Sophy, he felt sure, not to be moved by any pleading on the part of her husband. All the morphia was now in her possession. There was no other possible means by which Chesney could obtain the drug. All parcels were opened by Mrs. Chesney or his mother.

Besides, Chesney wrote no letters. He seemed perfectly indifferent about the post. Such letters as did come for him only bored him. They were all answered by his wife and Gaynor. Then, too, it was a great concession on Chesney's part to be willing for Anne Harding's return.

When after two days she wrote that her mother had pa.s.sed the crisis and was rapidly improving, that she (Anne) hoped to be able to return to Dynehurst within three weeks, he felt quite reconciled to the present arrangement. Sophy reported that Chesney never asked for a dose before the regular hours, or for an increase of the amount. She, too, was cheered and hopeful.

For a week this happy state of things lasted. Then one morning, after his daily visit to Chesney's room, Bellamy came to her with an hara.s.sed face.

"Mrs. Chesney," he said, "don't take it too hard--but your husband has got hold of morphia in some way. The symptoms are marked this morning.

It's inconceivable, I know; but there's the fact."

Sophy's air-castle broke in upon her in smothering vapours. She sank down on the nearest chair, and gazed out before her with blank eyes.

"Are you sure?" she asked mechanically, after a moment.

"Quite sure."

"Since when?"

"Only recently--during the night, probably. But the eyes show it unmistakably--and the dryness of the mucous membrane."

"I know," said Sophy. So well she knew that she felt as if her own mouth were like an ash, merely from her vivid realisation of the doctor's words.

"Have you taxed him with it?" she then asked.

"Yes. He only jeers. Asks me how he could have got it--says that he's not a wizard. It's terrible, Mrs. Chesney, terrible! If Nurse Harding were only here!"

"Yes. It seems as if Fate were against him."

"Fate!" cried Bellamy. "Himself, you mean! How he could descend to this when----"

He broke off abruptly, shocked by the white hopelessness of the young face.

"Forgive me," he said. "Besides, one should never judge too harshly in these cases. I've heard of men, anxious to be cured, getting well over the cursed thing, getting quite free of it for as much as a year, then, in some sudden moment of weakness, returning to it."

Suddenly a vigorous, alert look replaced Sophy's pa.s.sive expression. She stood up, facing the perturbed physician.

"What must we do?" she asked. "I am ready to do anything to save him.

Anything that I may do with self-respect--anything that will not put my boy in danger. Explain to me. Whatever it is, I will do it--if it is in my power."

She shone white and vivid against the grey, rain-strung frame of the hall window. She dazzled there in the dark, grim hall, flas.h.i.+ng something free and Amazonian into the staid discreetness of the sober, conventional house. Bellamy watched her, without being quite able to translate into clear thought the impression that she produced on him at that moment.

She put it into words for him herself: "I mean that I will fight for him like a comrade--not like a submissive wife--a slave," she said.

She stood for a moment looking down at her shoe-tip which she moved slightly to and fro. Then she said abruptly:

"How is my boy? Does his paleness mean that he is not well really--or is it only a pa.s.sing thing?"

"No, no," he hastened to rea.s.sure her. "The boy feels the confinement of the house, of course, but a week of sunny weather would have him right as a trivet."

"And if it keeps on raining?"

"I hardly think it will. We are nearly in July now. Rainy Junes are frequent in England, you know; but July is apt to show some fine weather."

"But in case it does not?" she persisted.

"Then I think a little outing to the Isle of Wight or the south of France might be the thing."

She pondered this.

"I see," she said at last. "And will you promise to tell me, the moment that you think Bobby needs such a change?"

"I do, indeed," he replied earnestly.

"Thank you. Now I feel free to give all my attention to my husband--for the present. I shall go to him myself now. It seems to me the last hope that we have."

"You mean that you will try to persuade him to--to--er--be frank with you?"

"Yes."

Bellamy looked at her in genuine distress.

"I'm afraid you must prepare yourself for disappointment, Mrs. Chesney."

"I am prepared for it," she said. Her voice was grave, but under the gravity there was depth on depth of bitterness.

"Well--G.o.d be with you!" said Bellamy, with much feeling.

"Thank you," she said gently.

She pa.s.sed out of his sight, going upstairs towards her husband's room.