In the human soul there is seldom any real perplexity. Only the body reasons; the soul knows. He knew this now. He knew, too, that there is a greater drill-master than that which was now disciplining his mind and body — the spiritual will — that there is a higher sentiment than the awakened instinct of mental and physical obedience — the occult loyalty of the spirit. And, within him, something was now awaking out of night, slowly changing him, soul and body.
As he sat there, tranquil, pondering, there came a shadowy figure, moving leisurely under the lighted windows of the hospital, directly toward him — a man swinging a lantern low above the grass — and halted beside him in a yellow shaft of light,
“Berkley,” he said pleasantly; then, to identify himself, lifted the lantern to a level with his face.
“Dr. Benton!”
“Surely — surely. I come from Paigecourt. I left Mrs. Craig and
Stephen about five o’clock; I have just left Miss Lynden on duty.
May I sit here beside you, Phil? And, in the first place, how are
you, old fellow?”
“Perfectly well, doctor. . . . I am glad to see you. . . . It is pleasant to see you. . . . I am well; I really am. You are, too; I can see that. . . . I want to shake hands with you again — to wish you happiness,” he added in a low voice. “Will you accept my warmest wishes, Dr. Benton?”
They exchanged a hard, brief grip.
“I know what you mean. Thank you, Phil. . . . I am very happy; I mean that she shall be. Always.”
Berkley said: “There are few people I really care for. She is among the few.”
“I have believed so. . . . She cares, deeply, for you. . . . She is right.” . . . He paused and glanced over his shoulder at the crimson horizon. “What was that shelling about? The gun-boats were firing, too.”
“I haven’t any idea. Something is on fire, evidently. I hope it is not Paigecourt.”
“God forbid!”
The doctor looked hard at the fiery sky, but said nothing more.
“How is Stephen?” asked the younger man earnestly.
“Better.”
“Is he going to get well?”
Dr. Benton thought a moment.
“He was struck by a conoidal ball, which entered just above the interclavicular notch of the sternum and lodged near the superior angle of the scapula. Assistant Surgeon Jenning, U. S. V., removed the bullet and applied simple dressings. There was a longitudinal groove on the bullet which may have been caused by contact with the bone, but there are no symptoms of injury to the osseous tissue. I hope he will recover entirely. Miss Lent, his affianced, is expected to-night. Arrangements have been made to convey him aboard a Sanitary Commission boat this evening. The sooner he starts North the better. His mother and Miss Lent go with him as nurses.”
Berkley drew a quiet breath of relief. “I am glad,” he said simply. “There is fever in the air here.”
“There is worse, Phil. They’re fine people, the Craigs. That mother of his stood the brutal shock of the news wonderfully — not a tear, not a tremor. She is a fine woman; she obeyed me, not implicitly, but intelligently. I don’t like that kind of obedience as a rule; but it happened to be all right in her case. She has voluntarily turned Paigecourt and all the barns, quarters, farms, and out-buildings into a base hospital for the wounded of either army. She need not have done it; there were plenty of other places. But she offered that beautiful old place merely because it was more comfortable and luxurious. The medical corps have already ruined the interior of the house; the garden with its handsome box hedges nearly two centuries old is a wreck. She has given all the farm horses to the ambulances; all her linen to the medical director; all cattle, sheep, swine, poultry to the hospital authorities; all her cellared stores, wines, luxuries to the wounded. I repeat that she is a fine specimen of American woman — and the staunchest little rebel I ever met.”
Berkley smiled, then his bronzed face grew serious in the nickering lantern light.
“Colonel Arran is badly hurt. Did you know it?”
“I do,” said the doctor quietly. “I saw him just before I came over here to find you.”
“Would you care to tell me what you think of his chances?”
“I — don’t — know. He is in considerable pain. The wound continues healthy. They give him a great deal of morphia.”
“Do you — believe — —”
“I can’t yet form an opinion worth giving you. Dillon, the assistant surgeon, is an old pupil of mine. He asked me to look in to-morrow; and I shall do so.”
“I’m very glad. I was going to ask you. But — there’s a good deal of professional etiquette in these hospitals — —”
“It’s everywhere,” said the doctor, smiling. Then his pleasant, alert face changed subtly; he lifted the lantern absently, softly replaced it on the veranda beside him, and gazed at it. Presently he said:
“I came here on purpose to talk to you about another matter. . . . Shall we step inside? Or” — he glanced sharply around, lantern held above his head— “I guess we’re better off out here.”
Berkley silently assented. The doctor considered the matter in mind for a while, nursing his knees, then looking directly at Berkley:
“Phil, you once told roe a deliberate falsehood.”
Berkley’s face flushed scarlet, and he stiffened in every muscle.
The doctor said: “I merely wanted you to understand that I knew it to be a falsehood when you uttered it. I penetrated your motive in telling it, let it go at that, and kept both eyes open — and waited.”
Berkley never moved. The painful colour stained the scar on his brow to an ugly purple.
“The consequences of which falsehood,” continued the doctor, “culminated in my asking Miss Lynden to marry me. . . . I’ve been thinking — wondering — whether that lie was justifiable. And I’ve given up the problem. But I respect your motive in telling it. It’s a matter for you to settle privately with yourself and your Maker. I’m no Jesuit by nature; but — well — you’ve played a man’s part in the life of a young and friendless girl who has become to me the embodiment of all I care for in woman. And I thank you for that. I thank you for giving her the only thing she lacked — a chance in the world. Perhaps there were other ways of doing it. I don’t know. All I know is that I thank you for giving her the chance.”
He ceased abruptly, folded Ins arms, and gazed musingly into space.
Then:
“Phil, have you ever injured a man named Eugene Hallam, Captain of your troop in the 8th Lancers?”
Berkley looked up, startled; and the hot colour began to fade.
“What do you know about Captain Hallam?” he asked.
“Where is he?”
“Probably a prisoner. He was taken at the cavalry affair which they now call Yellow Run.”
“You saw him taken by the enemy?”
“No. I saw him — surrender — or rather, ride toward the enemy, apparently with that design in mind.”
“Why don’t you say that Hallam played the coward — that he deserted his men under fire — was even shot at by his own colonel?”
“You seem to know about it,” said Berkley in a mortified voice. . . . “No man is anxious to reflect on his own regiment. That is why I did not mention it.”
“Yes, I knew it. Your servant, the trooper Burgess, came to Paigecourt in search of you. I heard the detestable details from him. He was one of the detachment that got penned in; he saw the entire performance.”
“I didn’t know Burgess was there,” said Berkley. “Is he all right?”
“Wears his left wrist in a sling; Colles’s fracture; horse fell. He’s a villainous-looking party; I wouldn’t trust that fellow with a pewter button. But he seems devoted to you.”
“I’ve never been able to make him out,” said Berkley, smiling.
The doctor thought a minute.
“I saw two interesting people at Paigecourt. One was Miss Dix, an old friend o
f mine; the other chanced to be Surgeon General Hammond. They were on a tour of inspection. I hope they liked what they saw.”
“Did they?”
“I guess not. . . . Things in the hospitals ought to go better now. We’re learning. . . . By the way, you didn’t know that Ailsa Paige had been to Paigecourt, did you?”
“When?”
“Recently. . . . She’s another fine woman. She never had an illness worse than whooping cough. I know because I’ve always been her physician. Normally she’s a fine, wholesome woman, Berkley — but she told a falsehood. . . . You are not the only liar south of Dixon’s damnable Line!”
Berkley straightened up as though shot, and the doctor dropped a heavy hand on his shoulder.
“The sort of lie you told, Phil, is the kind she told. It doesn’t concern you or me; it’s between her conscience and herself; and it’s in a good safe place. . . . And now I’ll sketch out for you what she did. This — this beast, Hallam, wrote to Miss Dix at Washington and preferred charges against Miss Lynden. . . . I’m trying to speak calmly and coherently and without passion, damn it! Don’t interrupt me. . . . I say that Hallam sent his written evidence to Miss Dix; and Ailsa Paige learned of it, and learned also what the evidence was. . . . And it was a terrible thing for her to learn, Phil — a damnable thing for a woman to learn.”
He tightened his grasp on Berkley’s shoulder, and his voice was not very steady.
“To believe those charges — that evidence — meant the death of her faith in you. . . . As for the unhappy revelation of what Miss Lynden had been — the evidence was hopelessly conclusive. Imagine what she thought! Any other woman would have sat aloof and let justice brand the woman who had doubly betrayed her. I want you to consider it; every instinct of loyalty, friendship, trust, modesty had apparently been outraged and trampled on by the man she had given her heart to, and by the woman she had made a friend. That was the position in which Ailsa Paige found herself when she learned of these charges, saw the evidence, and was informed by Hallam that he had forwarded his complaint.”
His grip almost crushed Berkley’s shoulder muscles.
“And now I’ll tell you what Ailsa Paige did. She went before Miss Dix and told her that there was not one atom of truth in the charges. She accounted for every date specified by saying that Miss Lynden was with her at those times, that she had known her intimately for years, known her family — that it was purely a case of mistaken identity, which, if ever pressed, would bewilder her friend, who was neither sufficiently experienced to understand what such charges meant, nor strong enough to endure the horror and shock if their nature were explained.
“She haughtily affirmed her absolute faith in you, avowed her engagement to marry you, pointed to your splendid military record; disdainfully exposed the motive for Hallam’s action. . . . And she convinced Miss Dix, who, in turn, convinced the Surgeon General. And, in consequence, I can now take my little girl away from here on furlough, thank God! — and thanks to Ailsa Paige, who lied like a martyr in her behalf. And that’s what I came here to tell you.”
He drew a long, shuddering breath, his hand relaxed on Berkley’s shoulder, and fell away.
“I don’t know to-day what Ailsa Paige believes; but I know what she did for the sake of a young girl. . . . If, in any way, her faith in you has been poisoned, remember what was laid before her, proven in black and white, apparently; remember, more than that, the terrible and physically demoralising strain she has been under in the line of duty. No human mind can remain healthy very long under such circumstances; no reasoning can be normal. The small daily vexations, the wear and tear of nerve tissue, the insufficient sleep and nourishment, the close confinement in the hospital atmosphere, the sights, sounds, odours, the excitement, the anxiety — all combine to distort reason and undermine one’s natural equipoise.
“Phil, if Ailsa, in her own heart, doubts you as she now doubts Letty, you must understand why. What she did shows her courage, her sweetness, her nobility. What she may believe — or think she believes — is born only of morbid nerves, overworked body, and a crippled power of reasoning. Her furlough is on the way; I did myself the honour to solicit it, and to interest Miss Dix in her behalf. It is high time; the child cannot stand much more. . . . After a good rest in the North, if she desires to return, there is nobody to prevent her . . . unless you are wise enough to marry her. What do you think?”
Berkley made no answer. They remained silent for a long time. Then the doctor rose and picked up his lantern; and Berkley stood up, too, taking the doctor’s outstretched hand.
“If I were you, Phil, I’d marry her,” said Benton. “Good-night.
I’ll see Colonel Arran in the morning. Good-night, my boy.”
“Good-night,” said Berkley in a dull voice.
Midnight found him pacing the dead sod in front of the veranda, under the stars. One by one the lights in the hospital had been extinguished; a lantern glimmered at the guard-house; here and there an illuminated window cast its oblong of paler light across the grass. Southward the crimson radiance had died out; softened echoes of distant gunshots marked the passing of the slow, dark hours, but the fitful picket firing was now no louder than the deadened stamp of horses in their stalls.
A faint scent of jasmine hung in the air, making it fresher, though no breeze stirred.
He stood for a while, face upturned to the stars, then his head fell. Sabre trailing, he moved slowly out into the open; and, at random, wandered into the little lane that led darkly down under green bushes to Letty’s bridge.
It was fresher and cooler in the lane; starlight made the planking of the little foot-bridge visible in the dark, but the stream ran under it too noiselessly for him to hear the water moving over its bed of velvet sand.
A startled whippoorwill flashed into shadowy night from the rail as he laid his hand upon it, and, searching for the seat which Letty’s invalid had built for her, he sank down, burying his head in his hands.
And, as he sat there, a vague shape, motionless in the starlight, stirred, moved silently, detaching itself from the depthless wall of shadow.
There was a light step on the grass, a faint sound from the bridge. But he heard nothing until she sank down on the flooring at his feet and dropped her head, face downward, on his knees.
As in a dream his hands fell from his eyes — fell on her shoulders, lay heavily inert.
“Ailsa?”
Her feverish face quivered, hiding closer; one small hand searched blindly for his arm, closed on his sleeve, and clung there. He could feel her slender body tremble at intervals, under his lips, resting on her hair, her breath grew warm with tears.
She lay there, minute after minute, her hand on his sleeve, slipping, tightening, while her tired heart throbbed out its heavy burden on his knees, and her tears fell under the stars.
Fatigued past all endurance, shaken, demoralised, everything in her was giving way now. She only knew that he had come to her out of the night’s deathly desolation — that she had crept to him for shelter, was clinging to him. Nothing else mattered in the world. Her weary hands could touch him, hold fast to him who had been lost and was found again; her tear-wet face rested against his; the blessed surcease from fear was benumbing her, quieting her, soothing, relaxing, reassuring her.
Only to rest this way — to lie for the moment unafraid — to cease thinking, to yield every sense to heavenly lethargy — to forget — to forget the dark world’s sorrows and her own.
The high planets shed their calm light upon her hair, silvering her slender neck and the hand holding to his sleeve, and the steel edge of his sabre hilt, and a gilded button at his throat. And all else lay in shadow, wrapping them close together in obscurity.
At times he thought she was asleep, and scarcely moving, bent nearer; but always felt the nervous closing of her fingers on his sleeve.
And at last sleep came to her, deadening every sense. Cautiously he took her hand; the slim fingers relaxed; body a
nd limbs were limp, senses clouded, as he lifted her in his arms and rose.
“Don’t — go,” she murmured drowsily.
“No, dear.”
Through the darkness, moving with infinite care, he bore her under the stars and stepped noiselessly across the veranda, entered, and laid her on his cot.
“Philip,” she murmured.
But he whispered to her that she must sleep, that he would be near her, close to her. And she sighed deeply, and her white lids closed again and rested unstirring on her pallid cheeks.
So she slept till the stars faded, then, awaking, lifted her head, bewildered, drawing her hand from his; and saw the dawn graying his face where he sat beside her.
She sat up, rigid, on the blanket, the vivid colour staining her from throat to brow; then memory overwhelmed her. She covered her eyes with both arms and her head dropped forward under the beauty of her disordered hair.
Minute succeeded minute; neither spoke nor moved. Then, slowly, in silence, she looked up at him and met his gaze. It was her confession of faith.
He could scarcely hear her words, so tremulously low was the voice that uttered them.
“Dr. Benton told me everything. Take me back. The world is empty without you. I’ve been through the depths of it — my heart has searched it from the ends to the ends of it. . . . And finds no peace where you are not — no hope — no life. All is desolation without you. Take me back.”
She stretched out her hands to him; he took them, and pressed them against his lips; and looking across at him, she said:
“Love me — if you will — as you will. I make no terms; I ask none. Teach me your way; your way is mine — if it leads to you; all other paths are dark, all other ways are strange. I know, for I have trodden them, and lost myself. Only the path you follow is lighted for me. All else is darkness. Love me. I ask no terms.”
“Ailsa, I can offer none.”
“I know. You have said so. That is enough. Besides, if you love me, nothing else matters. My life is not my own; it is yours. It has always been yours — only I did not know how completely. Now I have learned. . . . Why do you look at me so strangely? Are you afraid to take me for yourself? Do you think I do not know what I am saying? Do you not understand what the terror of these days without you has done to me? The inclination which lacked only courage lacks it no longer. I know what you have been, what you are. I ask nothing more of life than you.”
Works of Robert W Chambers Page 513
