The Cost [35]
her. As the time drew near, her mother came to stay with her; and day after day the two women sat silent, Mrs. Gardiner knitting, Pauline motionless, hands idle in her lap, mind vacant. If she had any emotion, it was a hope that she would die and take her child with her.
"That would settle everything, settle it right," she reflected, with youth's morbid fondness for finalities.
When it was all over and she came out from under the opiate, she lay for a while, open-eyed but unseeing, too inert to grope for the lost thread of memory. She felt a stirring in the bed beside her, the movement of some living thing. She looked and there, squeezed into the edge of the pillow was a miniature head of a little old man--wrinkled, copperish. Yet the face was fat--ludicrously fat. A painfully homely face with tears running from the closed eyes, with an open mouth that driveled and drooled.
"What is it?" she thought, looking with faint curiosity. "And why is it here?"
Two small fists now rose aimlessly in the air above the face and flapped about; and a very tempest of noise issued from the sagging mouth.
"A baby," she reflected. Then memory came--"MY baby!"
She put her finger in the way of the wandering fists. First one of them, then the other, awkwardly unclosed and as awkwardly closed upon it. She smiled. The grip tightened and tightened and tightened until she wondered how hands so small and new could cling so close and hard. Then that electric clasp suddenly tightened about her heart. She burst into tears and drew the child against her breast. The pulse of its current of life was beating against her own--and she felt it. She sobbed, laughed softly, sobbed again.
Her mother was bending anxiously over her.
"What's the matter, dearest?" she asked. "What do you wish?"
"Nothing!" Pauline was smiling through her tears. "Oh, mother, I am SO happy!" she murmured.
And her happiness lasted with not a break, with hardly a pause, all that spring and all that summer--or, so long as her baby's helplessness absorbed the whole of her time and thought.
XI.
YOUNG AMERICA.
When Pierson, laggard as usual, returned to Battle Field a week after the end of the long vacation, he found Scarborough just establishing himself. He had taken two small and severely plain rooms in a quaint old frame cottage, one story high, but perched importantly upon a bank at the intersection of two much-traveled streets.
"What luck?" asked Pierson, lounging in on him.
"A hundred days' campaign; a thousand dollars net," replied the book agent. "And I'm hard as oak from tramping those roads, and I've learned--you ought to have been along, Pierson. I know people as I never could have come to know them by any other means--what they think, what they want, how they can be reached."
There was still much of the boy in Pierson's face. But Scarborough looked the man, developed, ready.
Pierson wandered into the bedroom to complete his survey. "I see you're going to live by the clock," he called out presently. He had found, pasted to the wall, Scarborough's schedule of the daily division of his time; just above it, upon a shelf, was a new alarm clock, the bell so big that it overhung like a canopy. "You don't mean you're going to get up at four?"
"Every morning--all winter," replied Scarborough, without stopping his unpacking. "You see, I'm going to finish this year--take the two years in one. Then I've registered in a law office--Judge Holcombe's. And there's my speaking--I must practise that every day."
Pierson came back to the sitting-room and collapsed into a chair. "I see you allow yourself five hours for sleep," he said. "It's too much, old man. You're self-indulgent."
"That's a mistake," replied Scarborough. "Since making out the schedule I've decided to cut sleep down to four hours and a half."
"That's more like it!"
"We all sleep too much," he continued. "And as I shan't smoke, or drink, or worry, I'll need even less than the average man. I'm going to do nothing but work. A man
"That would settle everything, settle it right," she reflected, with youth's morbid fondness for finalities.
When it was all over and she came out from under the opiate, she lay for a while, open-eyed but unseeing, too inert to grope for the lost thread of memory. She felt a stirring in the bed beside her, the movement of some living thing. She looked and there, squeezed into the edge of the pillow was a miniature head of a little old man--wrinkled, copperish. Yet the face was fat--ludicrously fat. A painfully homely face with tears running from the closed eyes, with an open mouth that driveled and drooled.
"What is it?" she thought, looking with faint curiosity. "And why is it here?"
Two small fists now rose aimlessly in the air above the face and flapped about; and a very tempest of noise issued from the sagging mouth.
"A baby," she reflected. Then memory came--"MY baby!"
She put her finger in the way of the wandering fists. First one of them, then the other, awkwardly unclosed and as awkwardly closed upon it. She smiled. The grip tightened and tightened and tightened until she wondered how hands so small and new could cling so close and hard. Then that electric clasp suddenly tightened about her heart. She burst into tears and drew the child against her breast. The pulse of its current of life was beating against her own--and she felt it. She sobbed, laughed softly, sobbed again.
Her mother was bending anxiously over her.
"What's the matter, dearest?" she asked. "What do you wish?"
"Nothing!" Pauline was smiling through her tears. "Oh, mother, I am SO happy!" she murmured.
And her happiness lasted with not a break, with hardly a pause, all that spring and all that summer--or, so long as her baby's helplessness absorbed the whole of her time and thought.
XI.
YOUNG AMERICA.
When Pierson, laggard as usual, returned to Battle Field a week after the end of the long vacation, he found Scarborough just establishing himself. He had taken two small and severely plain rooms in a quaint old frame cottage, one story high, but perched importantly upon a bank at the intersection of two much-traveled streets.
"What luck?" asked Pierson, lounging in on him.
"A hundred days' campaign; a thousand dollars net," replied the book agent. "And I'm hard as oak from tramping those roads, and I've learned--you ought to have been along, Pierson. I know people as I never could have come to know them by any other means--what they think, what they want, how they can be reached."
There was still much of the boy in Pierson's face. But Scarborough looked the man, developed, ready.
Pierson wandered into the bedroom to complete his survey. "I see you're going to live by the clock," he called out presently. He had found, pasted to the wall, Scarborough's schedule of the daily division of his time; just above it, upon a shelf, was a new alarm clock, the bell so big that it overhung like a canopy. "You don't mean you're going to get up at four?"
"Every morning--all winter," replied Scarborough, without stopping his unpacking. "You see, I'm going to finish this year--take the two years in one. Then I've registered in a law office--Judge Holcombe's. And there's my speaking--I must practise that every day."
Pierson came back to the sitting-room and collapsed into a chair. "I see you allow yourself five hours for sleep," he said. "It's too much, old man. You're self-indulgent."
"That's a mistake," replied Scarborough. "Since making out the schedule I've decided to cut sleep down to four hours and a half."
"That's more like it!"
"We all sleep too much," he continued. "And as I shan't smoke, or drink, or worry, I'll need even less than the average man. I'm going to do nothing but work. A man