CHAPTER XXXI.

REPENTING AT LEISURE.

It _was_ just three years since Irene had left her husband's home. She lay upon her couch in her home at San Francisco. She had grown much older in appearance than she would have done had she led a different life, for late hours and careless exposure had brought on a hacking cough that not even the healthful climate of California could stay. She was so often left to pass her evenings alone when she did not feel able to go out, and while Max was enjoying himself at a game of billiards or cards. She grew very much dissatisfied, and often would express herself in tones of deepest disgust, when Max entered the house, and seldom in a very pleasant mood. At such times he would incivilly reply, quite unlike former days.

She had coughed so incessantly all through the evening that she was quite exhausted, and two bright spots were burning on her cheeks. The clock struck two, and still she waited.

"I wonder how he can enjoy staying away so late," she said; "he is getting awfully selfish. He does not seem to care whether I live or die. They say all men are that way; but I don't know, I don't believe Scott would ever have been like that. I wonder what made me think of him, I haven't thought of him in so long. I suppose he has another wife before this. I wonder if he has. I wish I knew. Oh, dear, how my head aches, and that pain in my side is terrible. I wonder if Scott would have left me alone."

She checked herself suddenly. What it was that had brought Scott to her mind she could not tell; but for some cause unknown to herself, he was continually coming before her, and his hazel eyes seemed to look in scornful pity on her in her loneliness. She heard Max enter the hall door, and the next moment he stood before her in a state of intoxication.

"Well," he said, "you lazy thing, why don't you go to bed?"

"I waited for you," she said.

"What the deuce did you want to wait for me? You know I come when I get ready," he said, dropping into a chair.

"Yes, I know you do, and I have no idea of wearing my life out watching for you, night after night."

"Why don't you go out yourself, then?"

"I don't feel like it."

"But you see I do, so there is the difference between you and me."

"I am ill and I can't go out and enjoy myself as you do."

"So am I," he said, with a sneering laugh.

"At any rate you seem to enjoy yourself, or you would not stay so long."

"Well, if I do, it's my own business."

"It is my business," she said, angrily.

"I'd like to see you help yourself," he said, turning fiercely toward her.

She burst into tears.

"You might stay with me when I'm ill," she said. "I don't like to stay alone; I get so nervous that I sometimes think I'm going to die."

Max laughed boisterously, as he said:

"Oh, I guess there's no danger of that. If you think there is you had better go back to that other man of yours. I'd rather have a live wife on my hands any day than a dead one, as I have no particular fancy for funerals; they create too much of a sensation."

"Mercy, how you talk. I am sure I don't want to die, but I don't believe Scott would let me into the house if I were to go back to him."

"Oh, yes, he would; he is one of those Christian fellows, you know. He would let you go back and run the Wilmer mansion, just as you used to, and then if you took a notion to run off with a handsomer man, he'd let you go and not even apply for a divorce. Say, do you know you are his wife just as much as you ever was?"

Irene started. She wondered what it was that had taken possession of Max to induce him to talk so harshly to her. It was true she knew he was under the influence of liquor, but he should have enough sense left to treat her as though she were human, even if he had made a brute of himself.

"Do you know," he repeated, "that you are Scott Wilmer's wife?"

"No, I don't know it," she said, wiping the tears away. "I am your wife."

"Where is your certificate?" he asked mockingly.

"You should know; you know what you promised."

"Oh, well, promises don't stand in law worth a cent."

"I am sure that if Scott had promised anything it would have stood any law."

"Oh, yes, but you see Scott is one of your Christian fellows; he wouldn't lie to save his soul."

"No, he would never break a promise. But what is the use of talking about him?" she asked, impatiently. "It is quite likely he is married before this time."

"Oh, come, now, Rene, you know better than that; you know he never believed in divorces, and I'll bet my head he is not married."

"Well, I couldn't go back there if I wanted to."

"Try it."

"You must want to get rid of me. What is the matter with you, Max?"

"Oh, nothing, only to tell you the truth, I know a little fairy who is crazy for me to make love to her, and she is one of the neatest little dancers in all the world."

"Max," cried Irene, angrily, "you are a perfect devil, and I wish I had never seen you. I wish I had never left Scott."

A fresh burst of tears and a violent fit of coughing followed this outburst of anger, and Irene sank back exhausted on her pillow.

"I wish you never had left him," Max said, wiping his bloodshot eyes, as he arose and started to leave the room. "I am going to bed; you can spend the rest of the night there if you want to."

"Oh, dear," sobbed Irene, as she was left again to herself. "Oh, how I wish I had never left home. I think Max is too cross to live. He really abuses me, and after making so many promises, too. I wonder why I am not as much of an angel now as I used to be. Oh dear, oh dear. Perhaps Max will be better natured when he gets over his fit of drunkenness. If I were not so ill I would get even with him yet."

Again the face of Scott Wilmer came before her, and the searching eyes seemed to look into hers with a gaze that burned down into her very soul.

"What a fool I am," she said, as though angry at herself. "I can't get back what I have thrown away, so I must think no more of Scott. I don't intend to do much coaxing with Max either. If he is making love to some little fairy, as he calls her, I will follow him and find out who she is, and it will be a dear job for both of them. Curse him, what has he done; brought me out here, perhaps to die alone? Oh, I'll curse them both if I find him playing false to me."

She half arose from the couch, then sank back suddenly.

"Oh, oh, that pain in my side is awful. I wish Max would go for the doctor; but I wouldn't dare to ask him, for he would only laugh at me, and he wouldn't go."

Irene drew a shawl about her shoulders and tried to sleep, but no sleep came to her until the morning dawned, then she sank into a light slumber.

"Why, how pale you look, Miss Wilmer," said Mary, touching her arm, "are you ill?"

"I coughed so hard all night that I am nearly dead."

"I should think you was quite dead by the color of you. You had better get up and have a cup of coffee, or shall I bring it to you?"

"No. I would rather get up. Where is Max?"

"Asleep. He don't want to get up yet; guess he's cross by the way he ordered me to leave."

"Let him sleep," said Irene, as she arose with a languid air. She walked to the mirror, and looking in, she started at the sight of her own face, which was as pale as marble, and her eyes sunken and surrounded by great dark circles. Her hair twisted in an unbecoming knot at the back of her head seemed to add ten years to her life.

"Bring my false hair, Mary," she said, "and see if you cannot make me look a little more respectable. I am a fright."

"Oh, I shall have to lie down again. I am growing faint," said Irene, as Mary started to arrange her hair.

"Mercy," said Mary, as she helped her to the couch, "you look like a dead woman; you had better let me bring your coffee and toast in for you."

Irene made no objection, and after Mary had bathed her face with camphor she brought her a tempting light breakfast, of which Irene forced herself to eat that she might have strength to arise, but for a number of days she was confined to her bed. Her cough, which was growing worse each day, had worn her to a mere shadow of her former self, and strive as she would to appear cheerful, she could not hide the truth which was each day growing more and more apparent.

"I wish you would stay with me to-night, Max," she said, one evening, as she lay upon the couch, "I want to tell you something."

"I couldn't think of it, my dear. I've got an engagement; but if it is anything of importance you may as well tell me all about it before I go."

"You are very independent lately, but it may bring you down a little to have me tell you that father has been here, and says we've got to move. He has lost this house through his gambling, and we must go back to San Bernardino."

"The devil!" said Max, with a frown.

"Yes, and there's no telling what the next turn will be. He is losing money all the time. I should think it was about time you came in possession of your wealth."

Max, looking down at the floor, said:

"Don't trouble yourself about my fortune, just look out for your own."

"There won't be any of my own to trouble myself about, if you and my father have the handling of it."

"We'll talk about that some other time," said Max, as he left the house, without even a good bye to the woman he called his wife.

"Where are you going?" Irene called out, as he passed through the doorway.

"That is my business," he replied, angrily.

"It will be mine, too," she said, as she arose, trembling with rage.

It was her intention to follow Max, but when she tried to put on her wrap she found herself unable to do so, sinking back upon the couch.

"I will not bear it, so help me, heaven. He shall not treat me so, leaving me ill and alone. I will follow him," she said, trying again to arise, but was prostrated by a deathly faintness which followed her effort.

"Mary," she called.

Mary came hurrying in.

"What is it?" she asked in alarm.

"I want you to bring me a cup of strong tea--no, a good brandy sling will be better, I am really chilly."

Mary brought the brandy.

"I wanted to go out, but when I tried to get ready I found I could not stand, and if I fail after this brandy has warmed me up I want you to do the errand for me."

"What is it?"

"I want you to hurry down town and see if you can see where Max has gone."

"Why," said Mary, "I can't leave you alone."

"Go on, I say. I can take care of myself," Irene said angrily, at the same time making another effort to arise, but this time sinking back in a dead faint.

"Oh! oh! Such a time as I do have with her, she so fretful," said Mary. "I do wonder what has come between those two anyway; they quarrel all the time lately, and she so sick, too. Oh, dear, I wonder if she's going to die?"

"No," said Irene, as she slowly opened her eyes. "I won't die. No, that would please him too well. He would be glad to come and find me dead, but I won't die, I won't die."

"Why, how you talk; of course your husband don't want you to die. Please lie down. You will get crazy if you talk in that way."

"Has Max come yet?" she asked, when in the morning she awoke and found Mary sitting near her.

"No; but I think he will be here by breakfast time," said Mary.

A cold fear shot through Irene's heart.

The day passed, and still another, and Max did not come. Irene was growing extremely nervous. With constant watching and wishing she at last gave up in despair. She sent a message to her father, but at the end of a week she had received no word from him, and, lying there alone and unable to lift her head from her pillow, seemingly deserted by her father and the man who "could not live without her," Irene Wilmer gave herself up to the bitterest reflections. She wept until the fountain of tears was entirely exhausted. She cursed the day that Max Brunswick ever crossed her path, to take her away from her home and a husband who would never have spoken a harsh word to her. She could look back now and see all that she had lost. She could see, now that disease had laid hold of her and held her down with hands which could not be defied, that she had lost the whole world. She tried to picture something brighter than the dark cloud she saw. She tried to fancy herself back in Scott's home, and that she was living there an honored wife. Amid her vain fancies she fell asleep. She saw herself on a broad sea of deep and muddy waters, tossed up and down on the angry waves, and Scott standing with folded arms upon a high and massive rock above. How like a god he seemed to her, as he stood there with his fine manly form outlined against the blue sky above, his auburn locks lifted from his noble brow by the breeze, and his searching eyes gazing down upon her. She reached out her hands, and called upon him to save her, but he closed his lips firmly, and still retaining his rigid position, he gazed at her as she floated away and went sinking down, down, down.

"Oh, Scott," she moaned, as she sank below the surface, "save me, save me."

"Why, who in the world are you calling for?" asked Mary. "Who is Scott? Why you must have been awfully choked, for you gasped two or three times as though you could hardly breathe."

"I had a terrible dream, and I have such pain in my chest too."

"I believe I'll go for the doctor," said Mary.

"Yes, for I don't see that I shall ever get better unless I have some medicine. Bring my purse."

Mary did as directed, and when Irene had opened it she uttered a cry:

"Oh, the wretch, to think that he could do that."

"What is it?" Mary asked.

"He has taken nearly all my money, and there is but fifty dollars left. Oh, what in heaven's name will become of me?"

"Let me bring the doctor at any rate," said Mary.

"Yes, go; I must have something to help me up. I shall go wild to lie here another day."

Mary called the physician.

"Do you think I am going to die?" Irene asked abruptly.

The doctor looked at her a moment in silence.

"I want to know just what you think. If you think I won't get well, I want to know it, and I want you to tell me what is the matter."

"You have consumption."

"Oh, don't tell me that," she said in a trembling voice.

"You ordered me to tell you the truth."

"Yes, I know. How soon do you think I will die?"

"That, madam, is only a question of time. Your disease has passed the aid of human skill, and you may as well know the worst, if you have any business to attend to. Consumption is very flattering, and it is quite impossible to determine when the disease will meet with a change. You may live a year and you may not."

"Tell me truly; do you think I will not live long?"

"I cannot really tell," the doctor said evasively. "I think your time is short."

"Will I never get up again?"

"Yes, I may strengthen you and alleviate your pain."

"So I must die," Irene said, as the physician, after having prepared her medicine, left her. "Oh, dear, it's awful to die; I wish I could live, but if I must die I wish I were back with Scott. I am sure he never would have left me alone, as I am now. He would have tried to make it pleasant for me. I wonder if he would let me go back there. Oh, it makes me shudder to think of dying out here alone; it doesn't seem as though I could. I believe I could die easier if I could get back to Scott. But, oh, I am afraid he never would speak to me again. How I wish I had never left him; and now Max has gone too; left me as I left Scott."

She tried to think that Max would yet return, but she thought over all the cruel things he had said on that evening that he left her, and she could see no reason why he should stay so long if he ever intended to come back, and then the fact of his having taken the money was conclusive evidence of his remaining away. She wondered why it was that her mind turned so often toward Scott. She had very often thought of him and his kind acts since her sickness. She knew that she had no right to think of him, but the more she thought, the more she longed to see him, and to be in the home which she had deserted, and ere another week had gone by she had resolved to go to him, and perhaps in his generosity he would take her back to die at home.

"I think I am getting better, Mary," Irene said a few weeks after her interview with the doctor, "I mean to break up housekeeping and go East."

"Why, you ain't able to travel," said Mary.

"Yes, I am, I've got friends there who will not see me suffer. My father has never been to see me since Max went away, although I have sent him word at least a dozen times. I shall get enough for my household goods to take me to New York. I can hardly tell what to do, and I am too sick to live here alone."

"But if you should take cold traveling it might be your death."

"Oh, I shall die anyway, and I would rather die there than here," Irene said.

"Perhaps you will get well if you don't expose yourself."

"No, I won't, I shall die, and it is better to die with some one who will treat me well," she said mournfully.

"Yes, if you have friends it is better to be with them," said Mary.

After another week of anxiety Irene was ready to return to New York. She had heard nothing from Max or her father. She saw but one way open to her, and that was to go to Scott and ask his forgiveness. She did not know that he would grant it, but she would tell him how ill she was, and perhaps he would not turn her away.