me remind you of one circumstance, which is known to Dr.
Perrin--that I came to this place with the definite information that
symptoms of the disease were to be anticipated. Dr. Perrin knows
that I told that to Dr. Overton in New York. Has he informed you of
it?"
There was an awkward interval. I glanced at van Tuiver, and I saw
that he was leaning forward, staring at me. I thought he was about
to speak, when Dr. Gibson broke in, excitedly, "All this is beside
the mark! We have a serious emergency to face, and we are not
getting anywhere. As the older of the physicians in charge of this
case----"
And he went on to give me a lecture on the subject of authority. He
talked for five minutes, ten minutes--I lost all track of the time.
I had suddenly begun to picture how I would act and what I would say
when I went into Sylvia's room. What a state must Sylvia be in,
while we sat out here in the blazing mid-day sun, discussing her
right to freedom and knowledge!
28. "I have always been positive," Dr. Gibson was saying, "but the
present discussion has made me more positive than ever. As the older
of the physicians in charge of this case, I say most emphatically
that the patient shall not be told!"
I could not stand him any longer. "I am going to tell the patient,"
I said.
"You shall _not_ tell her!"
"But how will you prevent me?"
"You shall not _see_ her!"
"But she is determined to see _me!_"
"She will be told that you are not there."
"And how long do you imagine that that will satisfy her?"
There was a pause. They looked at van Tuiver, expecting him to
speak. And so I heard once more his cold, deliberate voice. "We have
done all we can. There can no longer be any question as to the
course to be taken. Mrs. Abbott will not return to my home."
"What?" I cried. I stared at him, aghast. "What do you mean?"
"I mean what I say--that you will not be taken back to the island."
"But where will I be taken?"
"You will be taken to the mainland."
I stared at the others. No one gave a sign. At last I whispered,
"You would _dare?_"
"You leave us no other alternative," replied the master.
"You--you will practically kidnap me!" My voice must have been
rather wild at that moment.
"You left my home of your own free will. I think I need hardly point
out to you that I am not compelled to invite you back to it."
"And what will Sylvia----" I stopped; appalled at the vista the
words opened up.
"My wife," said van Tuiver, "will ultimately choose between her
husband and her most remarkable acquaintance."
"And you gentlemen?" I turned to the others. "You would give your
sanction to this outrageous action?"
"As the older of the physicians in charge of this case----" began
Dr. Gibson.
I turned to van Tuiver again. "When your wife finds out what you
have done to me--what will you answer?"
"We will deal with that situation when we come to it."
"Of course," I said, "you understand that sooner or later I shall
get word to her!"
He answered, "We shall assume from now on that you are a mad woman,
and shall take our precautions accordingly."
Again there was a silence.
"The launch will return to the mainland," said van Tuiver at last.
"It will remain there until Mrs. Abbott sees fit to go ashore. May I
ask if she has sufficient money in her purse to take her to New
York?"
I could not help laughing. The thing was so wild--and yet I could
see that from their point of view it was the only thing to do. "Mrs.
Abbott is not certain that she is going back to New York," I
replied. "If she does go, it will not be with Mr. van Tuiver's
money."
"One thing more," said Dr. Perrin. It was the first time he had
spoken since van Tuiver's incredible announcement. "I trust, Mrs.
Abbott, that this unfortunate situation may at all costs be
concealed from servants, and from the world in general."
From which I realized how badly I had them frightened. They actually
saw me making physical resistance!
"Dr. Perrin," I replied, "I am acting in this matter for my friend.
I will add this: that I believe that you are letting yourself be
overborne, and that you will regret it some day."
He made no answer. Douglas van Tuiver put an end to the discussion
by rising and signalling the other launch. When it had come
alongside, he said to the captain, "Mrs. Abbott is going back to the
railroad. You will take her at once."
Then he waited; I was malicious enough to give him an anxious moment
before I rose. Dr. Perrin offered me his hand; and Dr. Gibson said,
with a smile, "Good-bye, Mrs. Abbott. I'm sorry you can't stay with
us any longer."
I think it was something to my credit that I was able to play out
the game before the boatmen. "I am sorry, too," I countered. "I am
hoping I shall be able to return."
And then came the real ordeal. "Good-bye, Mrs. Abbott," said Douglas
van Tuiver, with his stateliest bow; and I managed to answer him!
As I took my seat, he beckoned his secretary. There was a whispered
consultation for a minute or two, and then the master returned to
the smaller launch with the doctors. He gave the word, and the two
vessels set out--one to the key, and the other to the railroad. The
secretary went in the one with me!
29. And here ends a certain stage of my story. I have described
Sylvia as I met her and judged her; and if there be any reader who
has been irked by this method, who thinks of me as a crude and
pushing person, disposed to meddle in the affairs of others, here is
where that reader will have his satisfaction and revenge. For if
ever a troublesome puppet was jerked suddenly off the stage--if ever
a long-winded orator was effectively snuffed out--I was that puppet
and that orator. I stop and think--shall I describe how I paced up
and down the pier, respectfully but emphatically watched by the
secretary? And all the melodramatic plots I conceived, the muffled
oars and the midnight visits to my Sylvia? My sense of humour
forbids it. For a while now I shall take the hint and stay in the
background of this story. I shall tell the experiences of Sylvia as
Sylvia herself told them to me long afterwards; saying no more about
my own fate--save that I swallowed my humiliation and took the next
train to New York, a far sadder and wiser social-reformer!
BOOK III
SYLVIA AS REBEL
1. Long afterwards Sylvia told me about what happened between her
husband and herself; how desperately she tried to avoid discussing
the issue with him--out of her very sense of fairness to him. But he
came to her room, in spite of her protest, and by his implacable
persistence he made her hear what he had to say. When he had made up
his mind to a certain course of action, he was no more to be
resisted than a glacier.
"Sylv
ia," he said, "I know that you are upset by what has happened.
I make every allowance for your condition; but there are some
statements that I must be permitted to make, and there are simply no
two ways about it--you must get yourself together and hear me."
"Let me see Mary Abbott!" she insisted, again and again. "It may not
be what you want--but I demand to see her."
So at last he said, "You cannot see Mrs. Abbott. She has gone back
to New York." And then, at her look of consternation: "That is one
of the things I have to talk to you about."
"Why has she gone back?" cried Sylvia.
"Because I was unwilling to have her here."
"You mean you sent her away?"
"I mean that she understood she was no longer welcome."
Sylvia drew a quick breath and turned away to the window.
He took advantage of the opportunity to come near, and draw up a
chair for her. "Will you not pleased to be seated," he said. And at
last she turned, rigidly, and seated herself.
"The time has come," he declared, "when we have to settle this
question of Mrs. Abbott, and her influence upon your life. I have
argued with you about such matters, but now what has happened makes
further discussion impossible. You were brought up among people of
refinement, and it has been incredible to me that you should be
willing to admit to your home such a woman as this--not merely of
the commonest birth, but without a trace of the refinement to which
you have been accustomed. And now you see the consequences of your
having brought such a person into our life!"
He paused. She made no sound, and her gaze was riveted upon the
window-curtain.
"She happens to be here," he went on, "at a time when a dreadful
consideration. Here is an obscure and terrible affliction, which has
baffled the best physicians in the country; but this ignorant
farmer's wife considers that she knows all about it. She proceeds to
discuss it with every one--sending your poor aunt almost into
hysterics, setting the nurses to gossiping--God knows what else she
has done, or what she will do, before she gets through. I don't
pretend to know her ultimate purpose--blackmail, possibly----"
"Oh, how can you!" she broke out, involuntarily. "How can you say
such a thing about a friend of mine?"
"I might answer with another question--how can you have such a
friend? A woman who has cast off every restraint, every
consideration of decency--and yet is able to persuade a daughter of
the Castlemans to make her an intimate! Possibly she is an honest
fanatic. Dr. Perrin tells me she was the wife of a brutal farmer,
who mistreated her. No doubt that has embittered her against men,
and accounts for her mania. You see that her mind leaped at once to
the most obscene and hideous explanation of this misfortune of
ours--an explanation which pleased her because it blackened the
honour of a man."
He stopped again. Sylvia's eyes had moved back to the
window-curtain.
"I am not going to insult your ears," he said, "with discussions of
her ideas. The proper person to settle such matters is a physician,
and if you wish Dr. Perrin to do so, he will tell you what he knows
about the case. But I wish you to realize somehow what this thing
has meant to me. I have managed to control myself----" He saw her
shut her lips more tightly. "The doctors tell me that I must not
excite you. But picture the situation. I come to my home, bowed down
with grief for you and for my child. And this mad woman thrusts
herself forward, shoves aside your aunt and your physicians, and
comes in the launch to meet me at the station. And then she accuses
me of being criminally guilty of the blindness of my child--of
having wilfully deceived my wife! Think of it--that is my welcome to
my home!"
"Douglas," she cried, wildly, "Mary Abbott would not have done such
a thing without reason----"
"I do not purpose to defend myself," he said, coldly. "If you are
bent upon filling your mind with such matters, go to Dr. Perrin. He
will tell you that he, as a physician, knows that the charge against
me is preposterous. He will tell you that even granting that the
cause of the blindness is what Mrs. Abbott guesses, there are a
thousand ways in which such an infection can be contracted, which
are perfectly innocent, involving no guilt on the part of anyone.
Every doctor knows that drinking-cups, wash-basins, towels, even
food, can be contaminated. He knows that any person can bring the
affliction into a home--servants, nurses, even the doctors
themselves. Has your mad woman friend told you any of that?"
"She has told me nothing. You know that I have had no opportunity to
talk with her. I only know what the nurses believe----"
"They believe what Mrs. Abbott told them. That is absolutely all the
reason they have for believing anything!"
She did not take that quite as he expected. "So Mary Abbott _did_
tell them!" she cried.
He hurried on: "The poisonous idea of a vulgar Socialist woman--this
is the thing upon which you base your suspicions of your husband!"
"Oh!" she whispered, half to herself. "Mary Abbott _did_ say it!"
"What if she did?"
"Oh, Douglas, Mary would never have said such a thing to a nurse
unless she had been certain of it!"
"Certain?" he broke out. "What certainty could she imagine she had?
She is a bitter, frantic woman--a divorced woman--who jumped to the
conclusion that pleased her, because it involved the humiliation of
a rich man."
He went on, his voice trembling with suppressed passion: "When you
know the real truth, the thing becomes a nightmare. You, a delicate
woman, lying here helpless--the victim of a cruel misfortune, and
with the life of an afflicted infant depending upon your peace of
mind. Your physicians planning day and night to keep you quiet, to
keep the dreadful, unbearable truth from you----"
"Oh, what truth? That's the terrifying thing--to know that people
are keeping things from me! What _was_ it they were keeping?"
"First of all, the fact that the baby was blind; and then the cause
of it----"
"Then they _do_ know the cause?"
Dr. Perrin had a dreadful idea, that he had to hide from you because
otherwise he could not bear to continue in your house----"
"Why, Douglas! What do you mean?"
"I mean that a few days before your confinement, he was called away
to the case of a negro-woman--you knew that, did you not?"
"Go on."
"He had the torturing suspicion that possibly he was not careful
enough in sterilizing his instruments, and that he, your friend and
protector, may be the man who is to blame."
"Oh! Oh!" Her voice was a whisper of horror.
"That is one of the secrets your doctors have been trying to hide."
There was silence, while h
er eyes searched his face. Suddenly she
stretched out her hands to him, crying desperately: "Oh, is this
true?"
He did not take the outstretched hands. "Since I am upon the
witness-stand, I have to be careful of my replies. It is what Dr.
Perrin tells me. Whether the explanation he gives is the true
one--whether he himself, or the nurse he recommended, may have
brought the infection----"
"It couldn't have been the nurse," she said quickly. "She was so
careful----"
He did not allow her to finish. "You seem determined," he said,
coldly, "to spare everyone but your husband."
"No!" she protested, "I have tried hard to be fair--to be fair to
both you and my friend. Of course, if Mary Abbott was mistaken, I
have done you a great injustice--"
He saw that she was softening, and that it was safe for him to be a
man. "It has been with some difficulty that I have controlled myself
throughout this experience," he said, rising to his feet. "If you do
not mind, I think I will not carry the discussion any further, as I
don't feel that I can trust myself to listen to a defence of that
woman from your lips. I will only tell you my decision in the
matter. I have never before used my authority as a husband; I hoped
I should never have to use it. But the time has come when you will
have to choose between Mary Abbott and your husband. I will
positively not tolerate your corresponding with her, or having
anything further to do with her. I take my stand upon that, and
nothing will move me. I will not even permit of any discussion of
the subject. And now I hope you will excuse me. Dr. Perrin wishes me
to tell you that either he or Dr. Gibson are ready at any time to
advise you about these matters, which have been forced upon your
mind against their judgment and protests."
2. You can see that it was no easy matter for Sylvia to get at the
truth. The nurses, already terrified because of their indiscretion,
had been first professionally thrashed, and then carefully drilled
as to the answers they were to make. But as a matter of fact they
did not have to make any answers at all, because Sylvia was
unwilling to reveal to anyone her distrust of her husband.
One of two things was certain: either she had been horribly wronged
by her husband, or now she was horribly wronging him. Which was the
truth? Was it conceivable that I, Mary Abbott, would leap to a false
conclusion about such a matter? She knew that I felt intensely,
almost fanatically, on the subject, and also that I had been under
great emotional stress. Was it possible that I would have voiced
mere suspicions to the nurses? Sylvia could not be sure, for my
standards were as strange to her as my Western accent. She knew that
I talked freely to everyone about such matters--and would be as apt
to select the nurses as the ladies of the house. On the other hand,
how was it conceivable that I could know positively? To recognize a
disease might be easy; but to specify from what source it had
come--that was surely not in my power!
They did not leave her alone for long. Mrs. Tuis came in, with her
feminine terrors. "Sylvia, you must know that you are treating your
husband dreadfully! He has gone away down the beach by himself, and
has not even seen his baby!"
"Aunt Varina--" she began, "won't you please go away?"
But the other rushed on: "Your husband comes here, broken with grief
because of this affliction; and you overwhelm him with the most
cruel and wicked reproaches with charges you have no way in the
world of proving----" And the old lady caught her niece by the hand.
"My child! Come, do your duty!"