The Redemption of Anthony/Chapter 6
CHAPTER VI
"PRISCILLA MARTIN, what on earth have you done to Peter?" asked Mrs. Crompton abruptly, at the lunch-table two days later. "He acts like Death at the feast."
Priscilla cast a sympathetic glance at Peter's solemn fare. "I think Peter doesn't feel very well—do you? It's so hot—"
"Hot? Nonsense! It isn't a heat rash that Peter has; it's another disease; isn't it, Peter?"
"You ought to recognize the symptoms," he retorted.
"It isn't right to tantalize," interposed Drake. "Anybody feel up to an automobile ride after lunch?"
"Mercy! Tony, in this heat?" Mrs. Martin protested.
"Coolest place you can find," he said.
"I'd like to go," volunteered Priscilla.
"How about you, Peter?"
"No, thank you."
"Are you going to use The Parson, Mrs. Crompton? If not, I'll take him."
"Take him, and welcome," said she, pushing back her chair; "but don't lead him into mischief."
"That's your prerogative, I suppose," said Peter.
"Exactly, I'll exercise it on you in his absence, Peter, Peter, Pumpkin-eater."
"I think 'I'll wrap the drapery of me couch about me,' and lie down to pleasant dreams," said Mrs. Martin. "It's a fine day to sleep."
So The Parson, Priscilla, and Tony set forth in the machine, Priscilla on the front seat with Tony, and The Parson stretched out in perfect comfort on the roomy back seat.
"Where shall we go?" Tony asked the girl.
"Over there to the sky-line," she answered, pointing to where sky and woodland met.
He smiled and started. They rode swiftly by the rich valley farms which flanked the road on either side, stretching away to the sky, that shut down over the earth like a lid to a huge pot. The air was hot and vibrant with midsummer noises.
"Things feel sort of at their height," Priscilla said.
"So they are," Drake answered. "In another day or so we're over the edge and down toward fall."
"Too bad things can't ever stay at the height."
"You won't think so ten years from now."
They were silent for awhile, and when Priscilla looked around, The Parson was asleep.
"We're in the Seven League Boots," she said. "We're running away from the Devil to save The Parson."
"Poor Mrs. Crompton! Is she the Devil?" Drake laughed.
"Oh, no; I quite like Mrs. Crompton, don't you? She isn't as bad as she acts."
"None of us are—that's the saving grace."
"Let's go faster; I hear the Devil's footsteps."
"It's dangerous," he warned, letting out the machine a little.
"Faster!" she laughed. "I feel his breath on my neck."
He laughed and changed the speed recklessly to please her. He wanted to feel her close beside him, and to hear the childish laugh of delight.
"Faster! I hear his voice in my ear!"
The machine leaped at his hand like a living thing, and then the inevitable happened. Out into the road a baby toddled from a farmyard. Drake threw on the brake, called out, and tried to turn out. It was so sudden an onslaught that the machine did not respond, and the next thing he knew he lay beside a fence, a cold stream trickling down his face. Something near him groaned, and he sat up quickly and crawled to the heap of clothes lying against the fence. It was Priscilla, and she lay white and still, like a broken flower.
"God!" said Drake, and touched her face weakly.
"Drake! Drake!" called The Parson from somewhere. He turned and beheld the reverend gentleman struggling from under the upturned car, his head appearing unexpectedly among the cushions.
"Drake, if you could get me out I'd be obliged."
Drake tried to drag himself to his feet.
"In a moment," he said. "Are you hurt?"
"I don't know—I think not. Where's Priscilla?"
"There!" Drake almost sobbed.
"Is she hurt?" demanded The Parson, renewing his struggle.
"I'm afraid so."
"We haven't killed her, Drake?"
"God forbid!"
He finally dragged himself to the side of the machine and extricated The Parson, who was only shaken up. They went and bent over the girl, who had not moved. The Parson knelt down and listened for her heart-beats. To Drake it was an eon of agony before he nodded.
"It beats faintly," he said. "We must get help. You stay here while I go for the farm people."
He limped off, and Drake sat down, lifted Priscilla's head into his lap, and sat looking down at her. He didn't touch her, nor speak to her, nor did he mind the steady drip, drip, of blood from his cut head; he just sat and looked at the white face in his lap, and knew what it was to watch joy go; knew what Orpheus felt as Eurydice faded; knew what every man knows who faces the loss of his heart's desire. All the years of his life marched before him—empty-handed because they had not known Priscilla; the years to come approached with bowed heads, for they were not to know Priscilla; and the little present-in-between, where she had blossomed suddenly, like a morning-glory, grew all radiant with her.
Presently The Parson returned with the farmer and his wife, and very gently they lifted her and took her in, Drake following dully. The woman began to work over her, rubbing her hands and dashing water in her face.
"I telephoned Mrs. Crompton that we'd had a slight accident and would be home in an hour. She will have the doctor there."
Drake assented absently. All he cared about was the flutter of those eyelids, so long quiet.
"Let me tie up your head, Drake—it's a bad cut," said The Parson.
Drake pushed him aside and stood by the bed. Slowly, as if creeping back from the dead, Priscilla came to. Her eyes opened at last, and she sighed.
"Thank God!" said Drake; and it was a prayer to which The Parson said, "Amen."
"Mother!" breathed the girl.
"We'll see her presently," said The Parson.
"Where am I?"
"In a farmhouse. The automobile went into a ditch—"
"Oh, yes! The baby?"
"It's all right. We didn't touch it."
"You're hurt!"
"It's nothing. Are you better?"
"Yes, yes," she said, and tried to lift her hand to his head, but it hung limp, and she cried out with the pain.
Drake groaned as if it were his own.
"Tie his—head—up," she ordered.
Drake protested.
"Please—Tony," she whispered; and he sat still while The Parson and the farm woman washed and bandaged his wound.
"Don't tell mother—it will frighten her," Priscilla said.
"She knows we've had a slight accident," The Parson explained. "We're going to try to get you home in a wagon, if you think you can be moved."
"Yes, let's go home."
They put a mattress into a farm wagon and made her as comfortable as possible, the Parson sitting at her feet, to keep the rough bed steady, and Drake at her head. The farmer drove slowly and carefully. Every once in a while Drake swayed with heat and dizziness, but he pulled himself together, and once or twice, when Priscilla groaned, he came back from some other world, it seemed.
"Lie down beside her, Drake. I don't think you can hold out."
"I'll hold out," said Drake.
It seemed hours before the low bungalow came into view; and when they drove up, Drake saw Mrs. Crompton and the doctor in a mist. The doctor and The Parson lifted Priscilla's bed out and took her indoors. At the threshold of the living-room stood Mrs. Martin, pale and frightened. Drake went in and stood before her.
"See what I've done to her," he said.
Mrs. Martin glanced at Priscilla's white face, and then up at the man's hollow eyes and bloody head.
"Tony!" she cried. "Tony—you're hurt!"
She touched his head with her hand, but he threw it off.
"Never mind me," he said roughly.
"Look at her."
They carried Priscilla up-stairs and put her on her bed, leaving Mrs. Martin and the doctor there. Drake stumbled down-stairs and into his den, where he could be alone. Once there, he put his head in his hands and groaned: "God! she can not die, do you hear me? She can not die!" Over and over he cried out his defiance to the powers of life and death, until it became mechanical.
The door flew open and Peter burst in, white-eyed and haggard. "Damn you, Drake!" he cried. "Damn you! You've killed her—you've killed her!"
He threw himself down beside the table and burst into tears, but Drake said not a word.