Jezebel's Daughter Part 40

She had noticed Jack's pride in his character as "Keeper of the Keys."

There would be no fear of his returning to the subject of what he had remarked at Wurzburg, if she stung him in _that_ tender place. The result did not fail to justify her antic.i.p.ations. In fierce excitement, Jack jumped up on the hind rail of his mistress's chair, eager for the most commanding position that he could obtain, and opened his lips to tell the story of the night alarm. Before he could utter a word, Mrs. Wagner stopped him, with a very unusual irritability of look and manner. "The question was put to _me,"_ she said. "I am taking care of the keys, Madame Fontaine, at Jack's own request. He can have them back again, whenever he chooses to ask for them."

"Tell her about the thief," Jack whispered.

"Be quiet!"

Jack was silenced at last. He retired to a corner. When he followed Mrs.

Wagner as usual, on her return to her duties in the office he struck his favorite place on the window seat with his clenched fist. "The devil take Frankfort!" he said.

"What do you mean?"

"I hate Frankfort. You were always kind to me in London. You do nothing but lose your temper with me here. It's really too cruel. Why shouldn't I have told Mrs. Housekeeper how I lost my keys in the night? Now I come to think of it, I believe she was the thief."

"Hush! hush! you must not say that. Come and shake hands, Jack, and make it up. I do feel irritable--I don't know what's the matter with me.

Remember, Mr. Keller doesn't like your joining in the talk at dinner-time--he thinks it is taking a liberty. That was one reason why I stopped you. And you might have said something to offend Madame Fontaine--that was another. It will not be long before we go back to our dear old London. Now, be a good boy, and leave me to my work."

Jack was not quite satisfied; but he was quiet again.

For awhile he sat watching Mrs. Wagner at her work. His thoughts went back to the subject of the keys. Other people--the younger clerks and the servants, for example--might have observed that he was without his bag, and might have injuriously supposed that the keys had been taken away from him. Little by little, he reached the conclusion that he had been in too great a hurry perhaps to give up the bag. Why not prove himself to be worthier of it than ever, by asking to have it back again, and taking care always to lock the door of his bedroom at night? He looked at Mrs.

Wagner, to see if she paused over her work, so as to give him an opportunity of speaking to her.

She was not at work; she was not pausing over it. Her head hung down over her breast; her hands and arms lay helpless on the desk.

He got up and crossed the room on tiptoe, to look at her.

She was not asleep.

Slowly and silently, she turned her head. Her eyes stared at him awfully.

Her mouth was a little crooked. There was a horrid gray paleness all over her face.

He dropped terrified on his knees, and clasped her dress in both hands.

"Oh, Mistress, Mistress, you are ill! What can I do for you?"

She tried to rea.s.sure him by a smile. Her mouth became more crooked still. "I'm not well," she said, speaking thickly and slowly, with an effort. "Help me down. Bed. Bed."

He held out his hands. With another effort, she lifted her arms from the desk, and turned to him on the high office-stool.

"Take hold of me," she said.

"I have got hold of you, Mistress! I have got your hands in my hands.

Don't you feel it?"

"Press me harder."

He closed his hands on hers with all his strength. Did she feel it now?

Yes; she could just feel it now.

Leaning heavily upon him, she set her feet on the floor. She felt with them as if she was feeling the floor, without quite understanding that she stood on it. The next moment, she reeled against the desk. "Giddy,"

she said, faintly and thickly. "My head." Her eyes looked at him, cold and big and staring. They maddened the poor affectionate creature with terror. The frightful shrillness of the past days in Bedlam was in his voice, as he screamed for help.

Mr. Keller rushed into the room from his office, followed by the clerks.

"Fetch the doctor, one of you," he cried. "Stop."

He mastered himself directly, and called to mind what he had heard of the two physicians who had attended him, during his own illness. "Not the old man," he said. "Fetch Doctor Dormann. Joseph will show you where he lives." He turned to another of the clerks, supporting Mrs. Wagner in his arms while he spoke. "Ring the bell in the hall--the upstairs bell for Madame Fontaine!"

CHAPTER XIII

Madame Fontaine instantly left her room. Alarmed by the violent ringing of the bell, Minna followed her mother downstairs. The door of the office was open; they both saw what had happened as soon as they reached the hall. In sending for Madame Fontaine, Mr. Keller had placed a natural reliance on the experience and presence of mind of a woman of her age and character. To his surprise, she seemed to be as little able to control herself as her daughter. He was obliged to summon the a.s.sistance of the elder of the female servants, in carrying Mrs. Wagner to her room. Jack went with them, holding one of his mistress's helpless hands.

His first paroxysm of terror had pa.s.sed away with the appearance of Mr.

Keller and the clerk, and had left his weak mind stunned by the shock that had fallen on it. He looked about him vacantly. Once or twice, on the slow sad progress up the stairs, they heard him whispering to himself, "She won't die--no, no, no; she won't die." His only consolation seemed to be in that helpless confession of faith. When they laid her on the bed, he was close at the side of the pillow. With an effort, her eyes turned on him. With an effort she whispered, "The Key!"

He understood her--the desk downstairs had been left unlocked.

"I'll take care of the key, Mistress; I'll take care of them all," he said.

As he left the room, he repeated his comforting words, "She won't die--no, no, no; she won't die." He locked the desk and placed the key with the rest in his bag.

Leaving the office with the bag slung over his shoulder, he stopped at the door of the dining-room, on the opposite side of the hall. His head felt strangely dull. A sudden suspicion that the feeling might show itself in his face, made him change his mind and pause before he ascended the stairs. There was a looking-gla.s.s in the dining-room. He went straight to the gla.s.s, and stood before it, studying the reflection of his face with breathless anxiety. "Do I look stupid-mad?" he asked himself. "They won't let me be with her; they'll send me away, if I look stupid-mad."

He turned from the gla.s.s, and dropped on his knees before the nearest chair. "Perhaps G.o.d will keep me quiet," he thought, "if I say my prayers."

Repeating his few simple words, the poor creature's memory vaguely recalled to him the happy time when his good mistress had first taught him his prayers. The one best relief that could come to him, came--the relief of tears. Mr. Keller, descending to the hall in his impatience for the arrival of the doctor, found himself unexpectedly confronted by Mrs.

Wagner's crazy attendant.

"May I go upstairs to Mistress?" Jack asked humbly. "I've said my prayers, sir, and I've had a good cry--and my head's easier now."

Mr. Keller spoke to him more gently than usual. "You had better not disturb your mistress before the doctor comes."

"May I wait outside her door, sir? I promise to be very quiet."

Mr. Keller consented by a sign. Jack took off his shoes, and noiselessly ascended the stairs. Before he reached the first landing, he turned and looked back into the hall. "Mind this!" he announced very earnestly; "I say she won't die--_I_ say that!"

He went on up the stairs. For the first time Mr. Keller began to pity the harmless little man whom he had hitherto disliked. "Poor wretch!" he said to himself, as he paced up and down the hall, "what will become of him, if she does die?"

In ten minutes more, Doctor Dormann arrived at the house.

His face showed that he thought badly of the case, as soon as he looked at Mrs. Wagner. He examined her, and made all the necessary inquiries, with the unremitting attention to details which was part of his professional character. One of his questions could only be answered generally. Having declared his opinion that the malady was paralysis, and that some of the symptoms were far from being common in his medical experience, he inquired if Mrs. Wagner had suffered from any previous attack of the disease. Mr. Keller could only reply that he had known her from the time of her marriage, and that he had never (in the course of a long and intimate correspondence with her husband) heard of her having suffered from serious illness of any kind. Doctor Dormann looked at his patient narrowly, and looked back again at Mr. Keller with unconcealed surprise.

"At her age," he said, "I have never seen any first attack of paralysis so complicated and so serious as this."

"Is there danger?" Mr. Keller asked in a whisper.

"She is not an old woman," the doctor answered; "there is always hope.