East Angels Part 75

She remained where he had placed her. After a while she said, "I was so certain he was in the swamp!" Her tired eyes, beginning to glisten a little with tears, had a childlike look as she raised them to his.

Old Rose now came hurrying in with the coffee, its fragrant aroma filled the room. Winthrop poured it out himself, and made Margaret swallow it, spoonful by spoonful, until the cup was empty.

"You have a little color now," he said.

She put the cup down, and rose.

"You're going? Yes, go; go to bed, and sleep as long as you can, it must be near dawn. I will meet you here for a late breakfast at eleven."

She still stood there. "But will you--will you really----"

"Haven't I given you my word?" he said. "Are you afraid that I shall not be tender enough to him? Don't you comprehend that no matter how much I may hate him myself, his being your husband protects him perfectly, because, so long as you persist in continuing so subservient, he could visit anything else upon you?"

She went out without reply.

He sank into the chair she had left vacant to rest for a moment or two; he was desperately tired.

When he came back to the room at eleven, she was already there. It was a dark day, with the same New-England-feeling wind blowing over river and land; there had been spurts of rain, and he was wet. "Why have you no fire?" he asked.

"It did not seem cold enough."

"It's not cold, but it's dreary. I don't believe you have slept at all?"

he continued, looking at her. Opening the door, he called Rose, and told her to light the fire. When the old woman had finished her task--it was but a touch, and again the magic wood was filling the room with its gay light and faint sweet odor of the pine--he repeated his question. "I don't believe you have slept at all?"

"How could I sleep!"

He sat down before the fire. "You are wet. And you must be very tired,"

she went on.

"I am glad you have thought of it--I like sympathy. Yes, I am tired; but the room is cheery now. Let us breakfast in here?"

"You have found no trace?" Her nervousness showed itself in her tone.

"No."

She went to the door, and gave Rose an order. Then she closed it, and walked first to one window; then to another.

"Do come and sit down. You wander about like a ghost."

"I will step softly." She began to walk up and down the room with her light, rather long-paced step. "_You_ are not afraid," she said at last.

"No, I am not afraid; if he were wrecked in mid-ocean, he would make the whales cook his dinner for him, and see to it, too, that it was a good one."

"Oh, don't speak in that tone; don't jest about him when we cannot tell--Here we are safe at home, safe and comfortable, when perhaps he--"

she stopped.

"You are haunted by the most useless terrors. 'Safe,' are we? How 'safe'

were we last night, for his sake too, in that deadly swamp?--how safe were _you_? And 'comfortable'--I sitting here wet and exhausted, and you walking up and down, white as a sheet, eating your heart out with anxiety! 'And home,' did you say? I like that! Pretty place it was to bring you to--hideous barrack miles from every living thing. Of course you've made it better, you would make a cave better; he knew you would do it when he brought you here!"

He changed his bitter tone into a laugh, "Instead of abusing him, I ought rather to admire him--admire him for his success--he has always done so entirely as he pleased! If one wishes to be virtuous or heroic, I don't know that it is the best way; but if one wishes simply to be comfortable, it most certainly is. You can't philosophize?" he went on, turning his head to look at her as she continued her walk.

"No, no. Would you mind telling me what you have done?"

"I have three parties out; one has gone up the sh.o.r.e, and one down; the third is across the river."

"You are very good. For I know you don't believe he is here."

"No, I don't."

"But where, then, can he be?"

"You have asked me that before. This time I will answer that he is probably where he intended to be when he left here early yesterday morning--after ridding himself of Eliot and Dodd."

"You think he planned it. But why should he have been so secret about it? No one could have prevented him from taking a journey if he wished to take one."

"You would have prevented it; you wouldn't have thought him strong enough."

"That would not have deterred him."

"You're right, it wouldn't. Probably he didn't care even to explain that he did not intend to be deterred, Lanse was never fond of explanations."

"I am not at all convinced."

"I didn't expect to convince you. You asked me, and I had to say something."

After breakfast--she could eat nothing--he said, "I have sent for a little steamer; it is to take me to all the landings within ten miles of here. I shall not be back until late, probably; don't sit up." He left the room.

Fifteen minutes later, he appeared again.

"I was waiting for the steamer down by the water, when I saw the boy who brings the mail going away; you have had a letter?"

She did not answer. Her hands were empty.

"You heard me coming and concealed it."

"I have nothing to conceal." She rose. "Yes, I have had a letter, Lanse is on his way to New York; he is taking a journey--for a change."

"You will let me see the letter?"

"Impossible." She was trembling a little, but she faced him inflexibly.

"Margaret, I beg you to let me see it. Show me that you trust me; you seem never to do that--yet I deserve--Tell me, then, of your own accord, what he says. If he has left you again, who should help you, care for you, if not I?"

"You last of all!" She walked away. "Of course now that I know, I am no longer anxious,--I was foolish to be so anxious. We are very much obliged to you for all you have done."

"Very well, if you take that tone, let me tell you that I too have had a letter--Primus has just brought it from East Angels--it was sent there."

She glanced at him over her shoulder with eyes that looked full of fear--a fear which he did not stop to a.n.a.lyze.