Whosoever Shall Offend Part 46

"I'm afraid it is a 'perniciosa,'" he said. "Put her to bed while I call a regular doctor."

Regina looked up at him.

"I have fever, have I not?" she asked quite quietly.

"Yes. You have a little fever," he answered, but his big brown eyes were very grave.

When Marcello came, an hour later, she did not know him. She stared at him with wide, unwinking eyes, and there were bright patches of colour in her cheeks. Already there were hollows in them, too, and at her temples, for the perniciosa fever is frightfully quick to waste the body. In the Campagna, where it is worst, men have died of it in less than four hours after first feeling it upon them. Great men have discovered wonderful remedies for it, but still it kills.

Kalmon got one of the great men, who was his friend, and they did what they could. A nursing sister came and was installed. Marcello was summoned away soon after noon by an official person, who brought a carriage and said that Corbario was now conscious and able to speak, and that it was absolutely necessary that Marcello should be confronted with him, as he might not live another day. It was easier to go than it would have been if Regina had been conscious, but even so it was very hard. The nun and Teresa stayed with her.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "SHE SAT THERE LIKE A FIGURE OF GRIEF OUTLINED IN BLACK AGAINST THE MOONLIGHT ON THE GREAT WALL."]

She said little in her delirium, and nothing that had any meaning for either of the women. Twice she tried to tear away the linen and lace from her throat.

"I wait!" she cried each time, and her eyes fixed themselves on the ceiling, while she held her breath.

The women could not tell what she was waiting for, and they soothed her as best they could. She seemed to doze after that, and when Marcello came back she knew him, and took his hand. He sent away the nurses and sat by the bedside, and she spoke to him in short sentences, faintly. He bent forward, near the pillow, to catch the words.

She was telling him what she had done last night.

"But you promised that I should find you here to-day!" Marcello said, with gentle reproach.

"Yes. I did not mean to break my word. But I thought he would do it. It seemed so easy."

Her voice was weak with the fever, and sank almost to a whisper. He stroked her hand affectionately, hoping that she would go to sleep; and so a long time pa.s.sed. Then Kalmon came in with his friend the great doctor. They saw that she was not yet any better; the doctor ordered several things to be done and went away. Kalmon drew Marcello out of the room.

"You can do nothing," he said. "She has good care, and she is very strong. Go home and come back in the morning."

"I must stay here," Marcello answered.

"That is out of the question, on account of the Sister of Charity. But you can send for your things and camp in my rooms downstairs. There is a good sofa. You can telephone to the villa for what you want."

"Thank you." Marcello's voice dropped and shook. "Will she live?" he asked.

"I hope so. She is very strong, and it may be only fever."

"What else could it be?"

"Pneumonia."

Marcello bit his lip and closed his eyes as if he were in bodily pain, and a moment later he turned away and went down to Kalmon's apartment.

The Professor went back to Regina's side, and stood quietly watching her, with a very sad look in his eyes. She opened hers and saw him, and she brought one hand to her chest.

"It burns," she said, almost in a whisper, but with a strange sort of eagerness, as if she were glad.

"I wish I could bear it for you, my poor child," Kalmon answered.

She shook her head, and turned uneasily on the pillow. He did not understand.

"What is it?" he asked gently. "What can I do for you? Tell me."

"I want to see some one very much. How long shall I live?"

"You will get quite well," said Kalmon, in a rea.s.suring tone. "But you must be very quiet." Again she moved her burning cheek on the pillow.

"Do you want to see a priest?" asked the Professor, thinking he had guessed. "Is that it?"

"Yes--there is time for that--some one else--could you? Will you?"

"Yes." Kalmon bent down quickly, for he thought the delirium was coming again. "Who is it?" he asked.

"Aurora--I mean, the Signorina--can you? Oh, do you think you could?"

"I'll try," Kalmon answered in great surprise.

But now the hoa.r.s.eness was suddenly gone, and her sweet voice was softly humming an old song of the hills, forgotten many years, and the Professor saw that she did not know him any more. He nodded to Teresa, who was in the room, and went out.

He wondered much at the request, but he remembered that it had been made in the full belief that he would say nothing of it to Marcello. If she had been willing that Marcello should know, she would have spoken to him, rather than to Kalmon. He had seen little enough of Regina, but he was sure that she could have no bad motive in wis.h.i.+ng to see the young girl. Yet, from a social point of view, it was not exactly an easy thing to propose, and the Contessa would have a right to be offended at the mere suggestion that her daughter should speak to "Consalvi's Regina"; and there could not be anything clandestine in the meeting, if Aurora consented to it. Kalmon was too deeply attached to the Contessa herself to be willing to risk her displeasure, or, indeed, to do anything of which she would not approve.

He went to her house by the Forum of Trajan, and he found her at home.

It was late in the afternoon, and the lamp was lighted in the little drawing-room, which did not seem at all shabby to Kalmon's accustomed eyes and not very exigent taste. The Contessa was reading an evening paper before the fire. She put out her hand to the Professor.

"It is a bad business," she said, glancing at the newspaper, which had a long account of Corbario's arrest and of the murder of his old accomplice. "Poor Marcello!"

"Poor Marcello! Yes, indeed! I'm sorry for him. There is something more than is in the papers, and more than I have written to you and told you.

Regina has the perniciosa fever, complicated with pneumonia, and is not likely to live."

"I am sorry," the Contessa answered. "I am very sorry for her. But after all, compared with what Marcello has learned about his mother's death--and other things Corbario did--"

She stopped, implying by her tone that even if Regina died, that would not be the greatest of Marcello's misfortunes. Besides, she had long foreseen that the relations of the two could not last, and the simplest solution, and the happiest one for the poor devoted girl, was that she should die before her heart was broken. Maddalena dell' Armi had often wished that her own fate had been as merciful.

"Yes," Kalmon answered. "You are right in that. But Regina has made a rather strange request. It was very unexpected, and perhaps I did wrong to tell her that I would do my best to satisfy her. I don't think she will live, and I felt sorry for her. That is why I came to you. It concerns Aurora."

"Aurora?" The Contessa was surprised.

"Yes. The girl knows she is dying, and wishes very much to see Aurora for a moment. I suppose it was weak of me to give her any hope."

The Contessa dropped her newspaper and looked into the fire thoughtfully before she answered.

"You and I are very good friends," she said. "You would not ask me to do anything you would not do yourself, would you? If you had a daughter of Aurora's age, should you let her go and see this poor woman, unless it were an act of real charity?"

"No," Kalmon answered reluctantly. "I don't think I should."

"Thank you for being so honest," Maddalena answered, and looked at the fire again.

Some time pa.s.sed before she spoke again, still watching the flames.