The New Penelope and Other Stories and Poems Part 28

"But you must not conjecture anything," she replied, with some asperity; "for you are sure to go wide of the truth. You think I have only to send for Mr. Hurst to bring him here; but you are mistaken. He cannot come, because he _dare_ not. He is in hiding, but I cannot tell you why. Only do not betray him; I ask no more. You are not called upon to do any more--to do anything against him, I mean." Seeing me hesitate, she continued: "I need not tell you that I believe my life is in your hands.

I have been living a long time with all my faculties upon a severe strain, so severe that I feel I shall go mad if the pressure is increased. I entreat you not to refuse me."

"Very well," I answered, "I will do what you require."

"It is only to take this"--she pulled a note from beneath her pillow, addressed to "Mr. Harry Hurst," and handed it to me--"to the address, which you will have no difficulty in finding, though I am sorry to have to send you on a walk so out of your way. And please take this also"--handing me a roll of coin, marked $100. "No answer is expected. Of course, you will not give these things to any one but Mr. Hurst. That is all." And she sunk back wearily upon her pillow, with closed eyes, as if she had no further interest in the affair.

I know as well as if she had told me that this note was a warning to fly, and this money the means to make flight good. I had promised to deliver them on her simple entreaty and a.s.surance that I should not dishonor myself. But might I not wrong society? Might not she be herself deceived about Hurst? The a.s.sertion of Quivey that he had collected money from her employers the day before occurred to me. Did she know it or not? I questioned, while regarding the thin, pale, weary face on the pillow before me. While I hesitated she opened her eyes with a wondering, impatient gaze.

"Do you repent?" she asked.

"I deliberate, rather," I replied. "I chanced to learn yesterday, that Mr. Hurst had drawn money from Craycroft & Co., and was thinking that if you knew it, you might not wish to send this also."

For an instant her black eyes blazed with anger, but whether at me or at Mr. Hurst I could not tell, and she seemed to hesitate, as I had done.

"Yes, take it," she said, with hopeless sadness in her tone, "He may need it; and for myself, what does it matter now?"

"I shall do as you bid me," I replied, "but it is under protest; for it is my impression that you are doing yourself an injury, and Mr. Hurst no good."

"You don't understand," she returned, sharply. "Now go, please."

"Very well; I am gone. But I promise you that if you exact services of me, I shall insist on your taking care of your health, by way of return.

You are in a fever at this moment, which I warn you will be serious if not checked. Here comes the doctor. Good-morning."

I pa.s.s over the trifling incidents of my visit to the residence of Mr.

Hurst. Suffice to say that Mr. Hurst had departed to parts unknown, and that I had to carry about all day Miss Jorgensen's letter and money. On returning home to dinner that afternoon, I found a stranger occupying Miss Jorgensen's place at table. He was a shrewd-looking man of about forty years, talkative, versatile, and what you might call "jolly."

Nothing escaped his observation; nothing was uttered that he did not hear, often replying most unexpectedly to what was not intended for him--a practice that would have been annoying but for a certain tact and good humor which disarmed criticism. The whole family, while admitting that our new day-boarder was not exactly congenial, confessed to liking his amusing talk immensely.

"He quite brightens us up; don't you think so, Mr. Quivey?" was Miss Flower's method of indorsing him.

"He does very well just now," replied Quivey, "though I'd lots rather see E. E. back in that place. When one gets used to pickles or pepper, one wants pickles or pepper; honey palls on the appet.i.te."

"I thought you had almost too much pepper sometimes," said Miss Flower, remembering the "I. I."

"It's a healthful stimulant," returned Quivey, ignoring the covert reminder.

"But not always an agreeable one."

I suspected that Miss Flower, who had an intense admiration for dramatic talent, entertained her own reasons for jogging Mr. Quivey's memory; and being willing to give her every opportunity to promote her own views, I took this occasion to make my report to Miss Jorgensen. As might have been expected, she had been feverishly antic.i.p.ating my visit. I had no sooner entered the room than she uttered her brief interrogation:

"Well?"

I laid the note and the money upon the bed. "You see how it is?" I said.

"He is gone?"

"Yes."

"I am so very glad!" she said, with emphasis, while something like a smile lighted up her countenance. "This gives me a respite, at least. If he is prudent"--she checked herself, and giving me a grateful glance, exclaimed, "I am so much obliged to you."

"n.o.body could be more welcome, I am sure, to so slight a service. I shall hope now to see you getting well."

"O, yes," she answered, "I must get well; there is so much to do. But my cla.s.ses and my writing must be dropped for a while, I presume, unless the doctor will let me take in some of my scholars, for, of course, I cannot go out."

"Your arm must begin to heal before you can think of teaching, ever so little. I have an idea, Miss Jorgensen, from what you have said of yourself, that this necessity for repose, which is forced upon you, will prove to be an excellent thing. Certainly, you were wearing out very fast with your incessant labor."

"Perhaps so--I mean, perhaps inforced rest will not be bad for me; but, O, there is such need to work! I can so poorly afford to be idle."

"What you say relieves my mind of a suspicion, which at first I harbored, that the firing of that mischievous pistol was not wholly accidental. I now see you wish to live and work. But why had you such a weapon about you? Are you accustomed to fire-arms?"

"The mischief this one did me shows that I am not; and my having it about me came from a fear I had of its doing worse mischief in the hands of Mr. Hurst."

"Are affairs so desperate with him?"

"Please don't question me. I cannot answer you satisfactorily. Mr. Hurst is in trouble, and the least that is said or known about him is the best. And yet you wonder, no doubt, that I should interest myself about a man who is compelled to act the part of a culprit. Well, I cannot tell you why at present; and it would be a great relief to know that you thought nothing more about it." This last she uttered rather petulantly, which warned me that this conversation was doing her no good.

"Believe, then," I said, "that I have no interest in your affairs, except the wish to promote your welfare. And I think I may venture to affirm that everybody in the house is equally at your service when you wish to command him or her."

"Thank you all; but I do not deserve your kindness; I have been so ill-tempered. The truth is I cannot afford to have friends; friends pry into one's affairs so mercilessly. Mrs. Mason tells me there is a new boarder," she said, suddenly changing the subject.

I a.s.sented, and gave what I intended to be an amusing account of the new-comers' conversation and manners.

"Was there anything said about me at dinner?" she asked, with a painful consciousness of the opinion I might have of such a question.

"I do not think there was. We were all so taken up with the latest acquisition that we forgot you for the time."

"May I ask this favor of you, to keep the conversation away from me as much as possible? I am morbidly sensitive, I presume," she said, with a poor attempt at a smile, "and I cannot keep from fancying, while I lie here, what you are saying about me in the dining-room or parlor."

Of course, I hastened to disavow any disposition on the part of the family to make her a subject of conversation, and even promised to discountenance any reference to her whatever, if thereby she would be made more comfortable; after which I bade her good-night, having received the a.s.surance that my visit had relieved her mind of several torturing apprehensions.

The more I saw and thought of Miss Jorgensen, the more she interested and puzzled me. I should have inclined to the opinion that she was a little disturbed at times in her intellect, had it not been that there was apparent so much "method in her madness;" this reflection always bringing me back at last to the conclusion that her peculiarities could all be accounted for upon the hypothesis she herself presented; too much work and some great anxiety. The spectacle of this human mite fighting the battle of life, not only for herself but for the strong man who should have been her protector, worked so upon my imagination and my sympathy that I found it difficult to keep the little woman out of my thoughts.

I kept my word to her, discountenancing, as far as I could, the discussion of her affairs, and in this effort Mrs. Mason co-operated with me; but it was practically impossible to prevent the inquiries and remarks of those of the family who were not so well informed concerning her as we were. The new boarder, also, with that quick apprehension he had of every subject, had caught enough to become interested in the patient up-stairs, and daily made some inquiries concerning her condition, and, as it appeared to me--grown a little morbid, like Miss Jorgensen--was peculiarly adroit in extracting information.

Three weeks slipped away, and Miss Jorgensen had pa.s.sed the most painful period of suppuration and healing in her arm, and had promised to come down-stairs next day to dine with the family. Mrs. Mason had just communicated the news to us in her cheeriest tones, as if each individual was interested in it, and was proceeding to turn out our coffee, when a servant brought in the letters for the house and laid them beside the tray, directly under the eye of the new boarder, who sat on the landlady's left.

"'Miss Jorgensen," said he, reading the address of the topmost one. "A very peculiar handwriting." Then taking up the letter, as if to further examine the writing, I observed that he was studying the postmark as well, which, being offended at his unmannerly curiosity, I sincerely hoped was illegible. But that it was only too fatally plain will soon appear.

With an air of _hauteur_ I seldom a.s.sumed, I recalled the servant, and ordered the letter to be taken at once to Miss Jorgensen. Before leaving the house I was informed that Miss Jorgensen wished to speak to me.

"Mr. Hurst has done a most imprudent thing!" she exclaimed, the moment I was inside the door. "I ought to have published a 'personal,' or done something to let him know I could not go to the post-office, and to account for his not hearing from me."

"He has returned to the city?"

"Yes!" She fairly ground her teeth with rage at this "stupidity," as she termed it. "He always does the very thing he ought never to have done, and leaves undone the things most important to do. Of course he cannot come here, and I can not go to him without incurring the greatest risk.

I really do not know what to do next."

Tears were now coursing down her pale cheeks--tears, it seemed, as much of anger as of sorrow.