CHAPTER XII

OF THE SHADOW.

As the night wore on, Mrs. Carruth and Mammy grew more and more anxious for their patient. The severe weather told upon him in spite of the even temperature of the cottage, and he suffered as a man upon the rack. With the intense pain came higher temperature, and by one o’clock Mrs. Carruth began to see that further medical advice was imperative; something more than they could do must be done for Charles, for he could not endure such torture for many more hours. Furthermore, his breathing had become very labored, and Mrs. Carruth feared the worst from that symptom. Without saying anything to Mammy she slipped noiselessly into the Bee-hive, meaning to ’phone to Dr. Black. In that little sanctum all was snug and quiet. Noiselessly removing the receiver, she tried to call up central. There was no response, and a shadow fell across her face. Then she tried her own home, but without result; the storm had completely disorganized the entire service. She was sorely troubled and about to slip back to Charles, when Jean’s face appeared at the top of the stairway, and she called softly:

“Mother, is Charles worse?”

“Why, dearie! What are you doing out of your bed at this hour?”

“Don’t scold me, Mumsey, I haven’t been in it, only lying on the outside, ’cause I thought you might need me; do you?”

“No, honey, certainly not. You must undress at once and get into bed.”

“But, mother, _is_ Charles worse? If he isn’t please let me go and sit with Mammy while you come in here and go to bed; you have been up all night. If he isn’t worse you can be spared, and I’ll be all the help Mammy needs. If he is worse you need me, anyway. I’ve had a long rest, and been asleep, too, though I tried hard not to.”

As she talked, Jean tiptoed down the stairs, and, coming close to her mother, slipped her arms about her waist and nestled her head against her shoulder. The past three months had made a great change in Jean. For a long time it seemed as though she never meant to grow another inch, for at thirteen she was no taller than a child of eleven, although plump and strong beyond the average child. Then she suddenly took a start and shot up, up, up, until now she was fully as tall as Constance, but slight and pliable as a willow wand.

Mrs. Carruth laid her arms caressingly about her shoulders, and rested her cheek against the wonderful hair: hair of the deepest, richest bronze, and soft and wavy to a degree.

“My little woman,” she said, very tenderly.

“If I truly am, then let me do a little woman’s part. You are tired and terribly worried about Charles. Let me come in and help.”

“There is so little we can do, Jean. We have done practically all we know how to do, and Dr. Black asked me to ’phone if there seemed to be any pronounced change. I haven’t said anything to Mammy, because I do not want to alarm her more than I must; but I would give anything to communicate with him, and the wires are down.”

“Yes, I know they are; Connie told me so before she went home, and that was one reason she wanted me to stay here: she was afraid you would need help during the night and be unable to get it.”

Mrs. Carruth was about to reply, when Mammy’s frightened face appeared in the doorway.

“Yes, Mammy! What is it?”

Poor old Mammy! One of the child-race, she was pitifully at a loss in the face of such a situation as the present crisis. Had it been any of her white folks she would have been efficient to the last degree, carrying out the precepts of “ole Miss,” who “raised” her, remembering with marvellous accuracy each detail of that ante-bellum training, and performing each with a patience and tenderness incomprehensible to those who have never known the heart-service rendered by those old-time servitors. But, strange anomaly, though a characteristic so very marked in her race, Mammy was utterly helpless when it came to taking the initiative for Charles or herself in sickness. Then she turned to her “white folks,” and if her Miss Jinny had bidden her drink strychnine, or give it to Charles, she would have obeyed her unquestionably. Strange people that they are!

“Please, come quick, Miss Jinny! I’se powerful trebbled. Charles he sought o’ wanderin’ in his min’ and talkin’ a heap o’ foolishness.”

Without a word Mrs. Carruth hurried from the Bee-hive in Mammy’s wake, Jean, unnoticed, close behind her. As she entered the room Charles was sitting upright, talking wildly and gesticulating to some imaginary person at the foot of his bed. Mammy, true to her instincts, flung her apron over her head, and, dropping upon her knees in the middle of the floor, cried:

“He sees de hants! He sees de hants! His hours done numbered!” and followed it up with earnest petitions for Charles’ life. Mrs. Carruth knew colored people too well to waste time in expostulations. She knew that the only way to bring Mammy back to her senses was to set about doing for Charles the things which Mammy, in a more rational frame of mind, would have done herself. Hurrying to his bedside, she said to the semi-delirious old man:

“Why, Charles, did you miss me when I went to speak to Miss Jean? It is Jean you wish to see, isn’t it? Well, here she is right at the foot of the bed, but you can talk to her quite as well when you are lying down. There, that is better,” as Charles, in obedience to her gentle easing down, let her lay him back among his pillows. Mammy caught sight of the act, and it recalled her to her senses quicker than a whip lash could have done. Springing to her feet, she hurried to the bedside, and taking her mistress by both hands forced her into the chair near at hand, exclaiming under her breath:

“Bress Gawd, baby! wha’, wha’ yo’ mean by liftin’ dat heavy man?”

Mrs. Carruth had not misjudged, but she was none the less concerned for Charles who continued to ramble on to Jean, who stood at the foot of the bed. A distant clock struck one-thirty. Mammy was doing all she could to quiet Charles, while Mrs. Carruth slipped into the adjoining room to prepare some medicine for him. Jean chose that moment to hurry back to the Bee-hive. A moment later the electric drop light was flashing its message across the snow-bound garden to the darkened house beyond. There was no response. Again and again Jean turned the switch, flashing out across the snow the bright light from the Tungsten bulb, and watching eagerly for some response, but the house remained perfectly dark; and at length, in despair, she gave up signalling and went swiftly back to Mammy’s side of the cottage. Creeping softly up to the bedroom she looked in. Her mother was too much occupied with Charles to notice her return, and Mammy was placing hot water bags at the old man’s feet. From the anxious look upon her mother’s face, Jean knew that she was seriously alarmed for Charles, who was trembling and quivering with a sudden chill. Without a word she turned and sped back to the Bee-hive. Five minutes later she opened the door and slipped out into the night. The storm had nearly ceased, but the clouds, driven by a wild, bleak wind, were still scudding across the sky. There was no moon, and it would have been a brave star which dared send its cheerful gleam through that cloud rack. Upon the ground the snow lay in deep wind-driven banks, in some places higher than Jean’s head. All the world was dark, silent, awesome. Jean never paused. She had formed her plans upon the instant, and was acting upon them as promptly. A hundred feet from the cottage old Baltie’s stable loomed in the darkness, the snow upon the eastern side of it banked high as the little window over his stall. Luckily the doors were upon the southern, more protected side of the building; and after struggling and wallowing through the snow until she was nearly breathless, Jean reached them. Pausing a moment to recover her breath, she inserted the key in the lock and opened the smaller door. She was instantly greeted by a soft nicker. Baltie never slept when the footfalls, however light, of those he loved drew near.

“Baltie, Baltie, dear,” cried Jean, softly, running to the box and opening the door, switching on the light as she ran. But neither light nor darkness meant anything to Baltie. His sensitive ears bounded his world of darkness, and love did the rest. His head was in Jean’s arms in a moment.

“Can you do it, dear? Can you do it for Charles and Mammy? I wouldn’t ask you to if I could go alone, but you are bigger and stronger than I am, Baltie, even if you are so old. Can you take me to Dr. Black’s through this deep snow? It isn’t so very far, Baltie, and we’ll be careful. Can you, Baltie? We must have him, for Charles is so sick.”

For answer the horse nestled closer to the girl, and nickered repeatedly.

“I know you mean ‘yes,’ dear. I know you do. I’ll be careful, Baltie. I’ll cover you up all warm and snug.”

As she talked, Jean threw over Baltie’s head the head and neck blanket, which Charles had insisted must be part of the old horse’s impedimenta during the severe winter months. Deftly pushing his ears into the ear coverings, she drew the hood over his head, his soft eyes shining upon her like two moons from the circular openings, and buttoned it around his throat. An extra blanket was quickly added, and then the old saddle was strapped on. Leading Baltie to the door, Jean switched off the electric light, gave one lithe little spring and landed across the saddle. It had not taken her long to shift from her ordinary clothing into Constance’s divided riding skirt up there in the Bee-hive, or to add the heavy outer garments the inclement weather made necessary.

“Now, Baltie, we must go, we must, dear. Please, please do your best for Charles and Mammy, they have been so good to you.”

As though he understood every word spoken to him, the horse bent to the driving wind and plunged into the unbroken road. Dr. Black’s home was less than a mile from Mrs. Carruth’s, and ordinarily Jean could have walked it in less than fifteen minutes, or run it in ten, and had often done so; but all walks and roadways were now completely obliterated. She must trust to her sense of direction and to Baltie’s wonderful instinct.

On plodded the good old creature, breaking into a light lope where the wind had swept the street comparatively free of snow, wallowing, pounding, pawing into the drifts where they barred his progress, snorting his protest, not at Jean, but at the elements, though never pausing in his efforts, which made him breathe hard, and more than once slow up for his second wind.

Jean had ridden from her earliest childhood, and had a man’s seat in the saddle. Now she leaned forward, her arms clasped about the great, heaving neck, the while speaking encouraging words into the ears laid back to catch her voice. As they drew near the more thickly settled portion of Riveredge, the blank, dense silence in which it lay impressed her strongly. During the first half mile the electric lights at measured intervals cast their fantastic gleam and shadows upon the snow. In this section they were numerous and brought into stronger relief the ghostly houses. Far off some shivering dog howled dismally, and instantly Jean thought of old Mammy’s superstitions, and her convictions “dat ef he howl _two_ times an’ stop, it sure is fer a man ter die.” This dog had howled “two times.” Jean was not superstitious, but she was the child of southern-born parents, and had been “raised” by a very typical southern “Mammy.” Tradition is very hard to overcome. She shivered, but not from the biting cold, though her feet were numb from it.

Not a human being was in sight as she turned into the street upon which Dr. Black’s house stood five blocks further down. They might almost as well have been fifty, for the street was narrower than most of the others, and running north and south had caught the full brunt of the northeaster. More than one piazza and front door was banked nearly to the piazza roof, and the street itself practically impassable.

Baltie had come bravely thus far, but such a white mountain as now lay before him was enough to daunt a young horse, much less an old blind one. He stopped, his flanks heaving, his head drooping. Jean was almost ready to give up in despair, for the cold had chilled her to the bone, and feet and hands were almost without sensation.

“Oh, Baltie, Baltie, my dear old horse, can’t you go a little further? Can’t you, dear? Please, please try just once more. It’s only a very little way now; only such a little way! I can see the light in front of Dr. Black’s door. I’d get off your back and walk, or try to, if I didn’t know that I couldn’t go five steps. Come, Baltie, please try just once more.”

Perhaps it was Jean’s pleading, perhaps Baltie’s wind had returned; at all events, he raised his head, gave a wild snort, a mad plunge, and, after a desperate struggle, floundered up to Dr. Black’s gate. The house was barely twenty feet from it, but the snow was up to Jean’s waist.

She never knew how she forced her way through it, or reached the electric button. She only knew she must do it somehow. When, in response to its prolonged jingling by his bedside, Dr. Black came back to this world of real things from the world of dreams, into which a long, hard day of work and exposure had carried him, and making a hurried toilet hastened down to the door, he found a huddled heap upon the doormat, and saw in the drifts beyond a quivering, panting horse.

In two minutes the whole household was astir, kind Mrs. Black had Jean up in her bedroom, the doctor administering restoratives, the doctor’s man had led Baltie around to the stable and was caring for him with all possible despatch.

“Look after her, Polly, and don’t let her leave that bed until I say she may. I must be off to Mrs. Carruth’s. I don’t believe she even knows this child is here. It’s all the result of this confounded storm and the wires being down. Such a blizzard as this hasn’t struck Riveredge in thirty years.”

It did not take Dr. Black as long to reach Mrs. Carruth’s home as it had taken Jean to reach his, and when he arrived he found a distracted household. Hadyn had rushed over to the Bee-hive to find Jean vanished, Mrs. Carruth entirely absorbed with Charles, who was in a very critical condition, and Mammy nearly beside herself. As Hadyn, in spite of Mrs. Carruth’s protests, insisted upon going after Dr. Black, he was confronted by that gentleman at the very door.