Chapter X: Drawing Together

JACK stole presently to my side and whispered in distress,—“Mother, she’s no better. Oughtn’t we to have a doctor?”

“We will try home remedies first,” I said, “as soon as Maimie will go upstairs. I don’t suppose it is anything serious.” Yet my heart misgave me as I spoke.

“Mother, you wouldn’t take it so quietly if it was one of us!” whispered Jack.

And I knew this was true, but I said—

“You would not refuse to do what I wish.”

Jack moved away, with a vexed and unhappy look. There was half-an-hour of silence, almost unbroken, except by an occasional low moan from Maimie. She checked herself at once when betrayed into it; but each time I heard a little unconscious echo from Jack, and he wore a face of utter misery. Cherry looked often from one to another of us, seemingly afraid to speak.

On Robert’s entrance a change came about. Generally he was back on Saturday to early dinner, but a City engagement had kept him this day till between four and five o’clock. Cherry ran out to meet him in the passage, and there were evidently a few words of explanation. When he appeared, a look of relief crossed Maimie’s face.

“Why, my poor little woman!” he said tenderly. “What is the reason of this?”

“I dare say it will go off soon,” murmured Maimie. “I shouldn’t mind so much, only it gives trouble.”

“Nobody minds the trouble, my dear,” Robert said, and Jack echoed the words with smothered eagerness, “But, Maimie, you must go upstairs.”

So Cherry must have told him my wish.

She fixed her eyes on his face. “Do you want me to go, Uncle?”

“Yes,” he said.

Maimie was on her feet before he could guess what she meant to do; and then she staggered and fell against him, with a little cry.

“Gently, my dear,—that was too quick,” Robert said. “You must move slowly, and let me help you.”

Jack’s arm, as well as my husband’s, was needed for the going upstairs. I could no longer keep down the fear that something must be really wrong. Maimie grew whiter at each step, and her short breaths of pain were almost sobs.

Cherry and I followed till the room was reached, and then the task of undressing followed. Maimie seemed to dread every movement; yet, on the whole, she bore up well, and did not complain. Only, when she was at last in bed, I heard a distressed moan of, “O I don’t know how to bear it! I don’t know how to bear it!”

“So bad still, Maimie?” asked Cherry.

“Not the pain only! It’s that too. But I wish—I wish—if only Aunt Marion would go!”

This was quickly hushed by Cherry, and I thought it wisest not to seem to have overheard.

Beyond things absolutely necessary in the household, little could be done that evening, except to tend Maimie. I could not flatter myself that such remedies as I was able to devise took much effect; yet we persevered in them, hoping for improvement on the morrow.

Night passed quietly to Robert and me, for Cherry would not disturb us. She had little or no sleep herself, for Maimie tossed and moaned all through the darkness. Towards morning, Cherry went down to the kitchen, where she lighted the fire and made a hot poultice. But still the pain continued; and when, at six o’clock, I stole into the room, I found Maimie suffering acutely, and Cherry sitting dressed on the bed supporting her.

“You ought to have called me, Cherry,” I said, when I gathered what the night had been. “I should have come in, but I was afraid of waking Maimie, if she were asleep.”

“Maimie would not let me, mother,” Cherry said gently.

I did not like Maimie’s look, or the burning hand which lay on the counterpane. She just lifted her eyes to mine, and then closed them again. But a little later, when I had sent Cherry downstairs to lay the breakfast-table, and was myself putting the bedroom straight, she said unexpectedly—

“Aunt Marion, I had better go to a hospital.”

I came to her side and asked, “Why?”

“I think I am going to be ill; and I shall only be a trouble. I can’t bear to be a trouble.”

I hardly knew what to say. Suppose it were really the right plan! After a pause, I remarked, “This may prove to be nothing.”

“O no—it is inflammation,” she said faintly. “I had it once before,—years ago,—and I was very very ill. If I am in a hospital, I shall be out of the way.”

“That is no reason,” I said gravely. “It is only a question whether we can do all that you would need.”

“It isn’t that I want to go,—of course. I do love Cherry,—and Uncle,—and—and—Jack is so good to me. But I had better go,—please—I don’t belong to you really,—and there’s nobody else—”

She broke into weeping, and sobbed hysterically, struggling with acute pain which wrung moans from her. “I don’t know how to bear it! I don’t know how to bear it!” passed her lips repeatedly, and soon that cry passed into another yet sadder,—“Oh, mother, mother! O if only mother were here!”

Coldness and jealousy went to the winds that hour. None was at hand to comfort the poor child: so the task of comforting fell naturally on me. Without any distinct intentions, I somehow found myself kneeling down beside the bed, drawing Maimie into my arms. There was first a startled backward movement on her part, and then she held me with a convulsive clutch. “O Aunt Marion, if only you could love me!” broke from her wildly, passionately.

“I do love you, Maimie,” I said; and I spoke truly, though till that minute it hardly had been truth.

“Do you? I thought you didn’t! I thought I was only in the way! It has been so terrible, so dreary.”

“Why, Maimie, you have always seemed bright enough.”

“Have I? It was all outside. I’ve been thinking all night that if I was to die it would put everything straight. Nobody wants me. Was I very wrong? I’m not afraid to die,—and I should be welcome up there. Was it wrong? I know Jesus died for me,—so I needn’t be afraid. There doesn’t seem any use in my living. Even father doesn’t care to have me.”

I don’t know how she bore to say or how I bore to hear all this. The words seemed to break from her like the bursting loose of a great wave, long pent up, finding at last an outlet.

“Don’t let go!” she moaned, when I would have stirred from an awkward position. “O hold me tight,—tighter! It feels like mother’s arms again. O hold me tight!”

Then as tears, which I could not keep back, fell upon her face, she looked up, startled.

“Aunt Marion, don’t cry! Have I said anything unkind?”

“No, darling,” I said, hardly able to speak.

“Do call me ‘darling,’—oh, do. It sounds lovely. It does comfort me so,” she said. “But I had better go to a hospital,—truly I had better. I don’t mind now. I shan’t mind anything, if you can love me.”

“We won’t think about the hospital yet,” I said, rallying my self-command, and speaking in a cheerful voice. “Plenty of time for that, Maimie. I want you now to lie quite still, and see if the pain does not get any better. Is it so very bad still?”

“Yes. But the other pain is better,” she said, with trembling lips. “Aunt Marion, kiss me,—once—once more.”

And the look of peace on her sweet face, when I stood up, was startling to me. What had I been about all those past weeks, with this poor lonely child longing for my love and sympathy, which yet I had studiously withheld?

Then I went downstairs, and told my husband and Cherry and Jack of Maimie’s proposal to go to a hospital. Robert heard silently. Jack burst into an angry exclamation.

“What do you think, mother?” Cherry asked.

“If Maimie goes, I’ll go too,” Jack said fiercely. “I’ll sit outside on the steps till she is well.”

“Jack, don’t be childish,” my husband said gravely. “The question is—would Maimie be best off here or there?”

“Here, of course,” Jack said.

“I would rather nurse her here,” murmured Cherry. “Mother, what do you think?”

I looked at Robert and said,—“I think Maimie might be actually better off there,—for food and medicine and so on. But she is a sensitive child,—and I think she would feel going among strangers. And Robert,—it does seem as if she had been given over to us, to be taken care of and I don’t like to send her away.”

Robert’s face lighted up with relief, and Cherry broke into a smile of happiness. But Jack threw his arms round me, and—big fellow that he was—burst into a flood of tears. I had my boy’s heart back again,—mine as much as ever it had been.