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From the Housetops, a novel by George Barr McCutcheon |
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Chapter 14 |
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_ CHAPTER XIV The next afternoon but one Templeton Thorpe was on the operating table. In a private sitting-room on the third floor of the great hospital, three people sat waiting for the result—two women and a man. They were the Tresslyns, mother, son and daughter. There were unopened boxes of flowers on the table in the middle of the room. The senders of these flowers were men, and their cards were inside the covers, damp with the waters of preservation. They were for Anne Thorpe, and they were from men who looked ahead even as she had looked ahead. But the roses and orchids they sent were never to be seen by Anne Thorpe. They were left in the boxes with their little white envelopes attached, for Anne was not thinking of roses as she sat there by the window, looking down into the street, waiting for the word from upstairs,—the inevitable word. Later on the free wards would be filled with the fragrance of American Beauties, and certain smug gentlemen would never be thanked. No one had sent flowers to Templeton Thorpe, the sick man. There had been a brief conference on the day before between Anne and Braden. The latter went to her with the word that he was to operate, provided she offered no objection. "You know what an operation will mean, Anne," he said steadily. "The end to his agony," she remarked. Outwardly she was calm, inwardly she shivered. "It is absurd to say that he has one chance in a million to pull through. He hasn't a single chance. I appreciate that fact and—so does he." "You are willing to do this thing, Braden?" "I am willing," he said. His face was like death. "And if I should object, what then?" she asked, almost inaudibly. "I should refuse to operate. I cannot pretend that an operation is the only means left to save his life. It is just the other way round. We are supposed to take extreme measures in extreme cases, but always with the idea of prolonging human life. In this instance, I am bound to tell you, that I don't believe there is a chance to save him. We must look the matter squarely in the face." "You said that there was absolutely no chance." She leaned heavily against the table. "I believe there is no chance, but I am not all-seeing, Anne. We never know,—absolutely. Miracles happen. They are not performed by man, however." "Have you spoken to Dr. Bates?" "Yes. He is coming to the hospital, to—to be with me." "He will not attempt to prevent the operation?" "No. He does not advise or sanction it, but he—understands." "And you will be held responsible for everything?" "I suppose so," said he bitterly. She was silent for a long time. "I think I shall object to the operation, Braden," she said at last. "For my sake and not for his, I take it," he said. "I may as well give him the tablets myself, as to consent to your method of—of—" She could not finish the sentence. "It isn't quite the same," he said. "I act with the authority of the law behind me. You would be violating the law." "Still you would be killing a fellow creature," she protested. "I—I cannot allow you to sacrifice yourself, Braden." "You forget that I have no false notions as to the question of right and wrong in cases of this kind. I assure you that if I undertake this operation it will be with a single purpose in mind: to save and prolong the life of my patient. The worst you can say of me is that I am convinced beforehand that I shall fail. If I were to act upon the principles I advocate, I should not feel obliged to go through the travesty of an operation. The time may come when cases of this sort will be laid before a commission, and if in their judgment it is deemed humane to do so, a drug will be administered and the horrors that are likely to attend my efforts of to-morrow will be impossible. There is no such law to sustain me now, no commission, no decision by experts and familiars to back me up, so I can only obey the commands of the patient himself,—and do the best I can for him. He insists on having the operation performed—and by me. I am one of the family. I am his only blood relative. It is meet and just, says he, that I should be the one, and not some disinterested, callous outsider. That is the way he puts it, and I have not denied him." "It is horrible," she moaned, shuddering. "Why do you ask me to consent? Why do you put it up to me?" "You now place me in the position of the surgeon who advises a prompt—I mean, who says that an operation is imperative." "But that isn't the truth. You do not advise it." He drew a long breath. "Yes, I do advise it. There is no other way. I shall try to save him. I _do_ advise it." She left him and went over to the fireplace, where she stood with her back toward him for many minutes, staring into the coals. He did not change his position. He did not even look at her. His eyes were fixed on the rug near the closed door. There was a warm, soft red in that rare old carpet. Finally she turned to him. "I shall not let you take all of the responsibility, Braden," she said. "It isn't fair. I shall not oppose you. You have my consent to go on with it." "I assume all responsibility," he said, abruptly, almost gruffly. "You are wrong there, Braden," she said, slowly. "My husband assumes the responsibility. It is his act, not yours. I shall always regard it in that light, no matter what may happen. It is his command." He tried to smile. "Perhaps that is the right way to look at it," he said, "but it is a poor way, after all." For a full minute they stood looking into each other's eyes. "Then I shall go ahead with the—arrangements," he said, compressing his lips. She nodded her head. "Before I go any farther, Anne, I want to tell you what happened this morning when his lawyer was here. I sent for him. There is a clause in my grandfather's will bequeathing to me the sum of one hundred thousand dollars. I insisted that a codicil be added to the instrument, revoking that clause. My grandfather was obstinate at first. Finally he agreed to discuss the matter privately with Judge Hollenback. A couple of hours ago Wade and Murray witnessed the codicil which deprives me of any interest in my grandfather's estate. I renounce everything. There will be no contest on my part. Not a penny is to come to me." She stared at him. "You refuse to take what rightfully belongs to you? Now that _is_ quixotic, Braden. You shall not—" "The matter is closed, Anne. We need not discuss it," he said firmly. "I had to tell you, that's all. The reason should be obvious. You know, of course, that the bulk of his estate, apart from the amount to be paid to you—" She winced perceptibly—"aside from that amount is to go to various charities and institutions devoted to the betterment of the human race. I need not add that these institutions are of a scientific character. I wanted you to know beforehand that I shall profit in no way by the death of my grandfather." After a significant pause he repeated distinctly: "I shall profit _in no way_." She lowered her eyes for an instant. "I think I understand, Braden," she said, looking up to meet his gaze unwaveringly. Her voice was low, even husky. She saw finality in his eyes. "He seemed to feel that I ought to know of the clause I mention," explained Braden dully. "Perhaps he thought it would—it might be an inducement to me to—to go ahead. God! What a thought!" "He allowed you to read it?" "A copy, last night. The real instrument was produced to-day by Judge Hollenback at my request, and the change was made in the presence of witnesses." "Where is it now?" "Judge Hollenback took it away with him. That's all I know about it." "I am sorry," she said, a queer glint in her eyes. "Sorry he took it away with him, I mean. There is nothing I can do—now." She sent for her mother that night. The next morning Simmy Dodge came down with George Tresslyn, who steadfastly refused to enter the house but rode to the hospital with his mother and sister in Simmy's automobile. Anne did not see Braden again after that momentous interview in the library. He had effaced himself. Now she sat in the window looking down into the street, dull and listless and filled with the dread of the future that had once looked so engaging to her. The picture that avarice and greed had painted was gone. In its place was an honest bit of colour on the canvas,—a drab colour and noteless. Mrs. Tresslyn, unmoved and apparently disinterested, ran idly through the pages of an illustrated periodical. Her furs lay across a chair in the corner of the room. They were of chinchilla and expressed a certain arrogance that could not be detached by space from the stately figure with the lorgnon. The year had done little toward bending that proud head. The cold, classic beauty of this youngish mother of the other occupants of the room was as yet absolutely unmarred by the worries that come with disillusionment. If she felt rebellious scorn for the tall disappointment who still bore and always would bear the honoured name of Tresslyn she gave no sign: if the slightest resentment existed in her soul toward the daughter who was no longer as wax in her hands, she hid the fact securely behind a splendid mask of unconcern. As for the old man upstairs she had but a single thought: an insistent one it was, however, and based itself upon her own dread of the thing that was killing him. George Tresslyn, white-faced and awed, sat like a graven image, looking at the floor. He was not there because he wanted to be, but because a rather praiseworthy allegiance to Anne had mastered his repugnance. Somewhere in his benumbed intelligence flickered a spark of light which revealed to him his responsibility as the head of the family. Anne was his sister. She was lovely. He would have liked to be proud of her. If it were not for the millions of that old man upstairs he could have been proud of her, and by an odd reasoning, even more ashamed of himself than he was now. He was not thinking of the Thorpe millions, however, as he sat there brooding; he was not wondering what Anne would do for him when she had her pay in hand. He was dumbly praising himself for having refused to sell his soul to Templeton Thorpe in exchange for the fifty thousand dollars with which the old man had baited him on three separate occasions, and wishing that Lutie could know. It was something that she would have to approve of in him! It was rather pitiful that he should have found a grain of comfort in the fact that he had refused to kill a fellow man! Anne took several turns up and down the room. There was a fine line between her dark, brooding eyes, and her nostrils were distended as if breathing had become difficult for her. "I told him once that if such a thing ever happened to me, I'd put an end to myself just as soon as I knew," she said, addressing no one, but speaking with a distinctness that was startling. "I told him that one would be justified in taking one's life under such circumstances. Why should one go on suffering—" "What are you saying, Anne?" broke in her mother sharply. George looked up, astonishment struggling to make its way through the dull cloud on his face. Anne stopped short. For a moment she appeared to be dazed. She went paler than before, and swayed. Her brother started up from his chair, alarmed. "I say, Anne old girl, get hold of yourself!" he exclaimed. "None of that, you know. You mustn't go fainting or anything like that. Walk around with me for a couple of minutes. You'll be all right in—" "Oh, I'm not going to faint," she cried, but grasped his arm just the same. "They always walked us around on the football field when we got woozy—" "Go out and see if you can find out anything, George," said she, pulling herself together. "Surely it must be over by this time." "Simmy's on the lookout," said George. "He'll let us know." "Be patient, my dear," said Mrs. Tresslyn, wiping a fine moisture from her upper lip, where it had appeared with Anne's astounding observation. "You will not have to wait much longer. Be—" Anne faced her, an unmistakable sneer on her lips. "I'm used to waiting," she said huskily. "She has waited a year and more," said George aggressively, glowering at his mother. It was a significant but singularly unhappy remark. For the first time in their lives, they saw their mother in tears. It was so incomprehensible that at first both Anne and her brother laughed, not in mirth, but because they were so stupefied that they did not know what they were doing, and laughter was the simplest means of expressing an acute sense of embarrassment. Then they stood aloof and watched the amazing exposition, fascinated, unbelieving. It did not occur to either of them to go to the side of this sobbing woman whose eyes had always been dry and cold, this mother who had wiped away their tears a hundred times and more with dainty lace handkerchiefs not unlike the one she now pressed so tightly to her own wet cheeks. They could not understand this thing happening to her. They could not believe that after all their mother possessed the power to shed tears, to sob as other women do, to choke and snivel softly, to blubber inelegantly; they had always looked upon her as proof against emotion. Their mother was crying! Her back was toward them, evidence of a new weakness in her armour. It shook with the effort she made to control the cowardly spasmodic sobs. And why was she in tears? What had brought this amazing thing to pass? What right had she to cry? They watched her stupidly as she walked away from them toward the window. They were not unfeeling; they simply did not know how to act in the face of this marvel. They looked at each other in bewilderment. What had happened? Only the moment before she had been as cold and as magnificently composed as ever she had been, and now! Now she was like other people. She had come down to the level of the utterly commonplace. She was just a plain, ordinary woman. It was unbelievable. They did not feel sorry for her. A second time, no doubt, would find them humanly sympathetic, troubled, distressed, but this first time they could only wonder, they could only doubt their senses. It would have been most offensive in them to have let her see they noticed anything unusual in her behaviour. At least that is the way they felt about it in their failure to understand. For five minutes Mrs. Tresslyn stood with her back to them. Gradually the illy-stifled sobs subsided and, as they still looked on curiously, the convulsive heaving of her shoulders grew less perceptible, finally ceasing altogether. Her tall figure straightened to its full, regal height; her chin went up to its normal position; her wet handkerchief was stuffed, with dignified deliberateness, into the gold mesh bag. A minute more to prove that she had completely mastered her emotions, and then she faced her children. It was as if nothing had happened. She was the calm and imperious mother they had always known. Involuntarily, Anne uttered a deep sigh of relief. George blinked his eyes and also fell to wondering if they had served him honestly, or if, on the other hand, he too had merely imagined something incredible. They did not question her. The incident was closed. They were never to ask her why she had wept in their presence. They were never to know what had moved her to tears. Instinctively and quite naturally they shrank from the closer intimacy that such a course would involve. Their mother was herself once more. She was no longer like other women. They could not be in touch with her. And so they were never to know why she had cried. They only knew that for a brief space she had been as silly as any ordinary mortal could be, and they were rather glad to have caught her at it. Years afterward, however, George was to say to Anne: "Queer thing, wasn't it, that time she cried? Do you remember?" And Anne was to reply: "I've never forgotten it. It _was_ queer." Nor did Mrs. Tresslyn offer the slightest explanation for her conduct. She did not even smile shamefacedly, as any one else certainly would have done in apology. She was, however, vaguely pleased with her children. They had behaved splendidly. They were made of the right stuff, after all! She had not been humbled. Apathy was restored. George slumped down in his chair and set his jaws hard. Mrs. Tresslyn glanced idly through the pages of a magazine, while Anne, taking up her position once more at the window, allowed her thoughts to slip back into the inevitable groove. They were not centred upon Templeton Thorpe as an object of pity but as a subject for speculation: she was thinking of the thing that Braden was doing, and of his part in this life and death affair. She was trying to picture him up there in that glaring little room cutting the life out of a fellow creature under the very eyes of the world. The door was opened swiftly but softly. Simmy Dodge, white as a sheet, came into the room.... Mrs. Tresslyn went over to the window, where Anne was sitting, white and dry-eyed. "It is no more than we expected, dear," said she quietly. "He had no chance. You were prepared. It is all over. You ought to be thankful that his sufferings are over. He—" Anne was not listening. She broke in with a question to Simmy. "What was it that you said happened while you were in the room? Before the ether, I mean. Tell me again,—and slowly." Simmy cleared his throat. It was very tight and dry. He was now afraid of death. "It was awfully affecting," he said, wiping the moisture from his brow. "Awfully. That young interne fellow told me about it. Just before they gave the ether, Mr. Thorpe shook hands with Brady. He was smiling. They all heard him say 'Good-bye, my boy,—and thank you.' And Brady leaned over and kissed him on the forehead. The chap couldn't quite hear, but says he thinks he whispered, 'Good-bye, granddaddy.' Awfully affecting scene—" "'Good-bye, granddaddy,'" Anne repeated, dully. Then she covered her eyes with her hands. Simmy fidgeted. He wanted to help, but felt oddly that he was very much out of place. George's big hand gripped his arm. At any other time he would have winced with pain, but now he had no thought for himself. Moreover, there was something wonderfully sustaining in the powerful hand that had been laid upon his. "She ought not to take it so hard, George," he began. "They told you he never came out of the anæsthetic," said George, in a half-whisper. "Just died—like that?" "That's what he said. Little chap with blond hair and nose-glasses. You remember seeing him—Yes, he told me. He was in there. Saw it all. Gosh, I don't see how they can do it. This fellow seemed to be very much upset, at that. He looked scared. I say, George, do you know what the pylorus is?" "Pylorus? No." "I wish I knew. This fellow seemed to think that Brady made some sort of a mistake. He wouldn't say much, however. Some sort of a slip, I gathered. Something to do with the pylorus, I know. It must be a vital spot." _ |
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