Sparrows Part 107

"Miss Hunter!"

"What of her?"

"First tell me, where was it you went for your--your honeymoon?"

"Polperro. Why?"

"That's one of the places she's been to."

"And you think---?"

"Her manner's so funny. And you wondered why I was so jolly keen on your not coming to Melkbridge!"

"I thought--I hoped my troubles were at an end," murmured Mavis.

"Whatever happens, you can rely on me till the death--when it's after dark."

"What do you mean?" asked Mavis.

"Why, that much, much as I love you, I'm not going to risk the loss of my winter fire, hot-water bottles, and books, for getting mixed up in any sc.r.a.pe pretty Mavis gets herself into."

The next morning Mavis went to business in a state bordering on distraction. The baby was not one whit better, and even hopeful Mrs Trivett had shaken her head sadly. But she had pointed out that Mavis could not help matters by remaining at home; she also promised to send for a doctor should the baby's health not improve in the course of the morning. Mavis was so distraught that she stared wildly at the one or two people she chanced to meet, who, knowing her, seemed disposed to stop and speak. She wondered if she should let her lover know the disquieting state of his son's health. So far, she had not told him of her coming to Melkbridge, wishing the inevitable meeting to come as a delightful surprise. When she got to the office, she found a long letter from Windebank, which she scarcely read, so greatly was her mind disturbed. She only noted the request on which he was always insisting, namely, that she was at once to communicate with him should she find herself in trouble.

When she got back at midday, she found that, the baby being no better, Mrs Trivett had sent her husband for a doctor who had recently come to Melkbridge; also, that he had promised to call directly after lunch.

With this information, Mavis had to possess herself in patience till she learned the doctor's report. That afternoon, the moments were weighted with leaden feet. Three o'clock came; Mavis was beginning to congratulate herself that, if the doctor had p.r.o.nounced anything seriously amiss with her child, Mrs Trivett would not have failed to communicate with her, when a boy came into the office to ask for Miss Keeves.

She jumped up excitedly, and the boy put a note into her hand. A faintness overwhelmed her so that she could hardly find strength with which to tear open the missive. When she finally did so, she read: "Come at once, much trouble," scrawled in Mrs Trivett's writing.

Mavis, scarcely knowing what she was doing, reached for her hat, the while Miss Toombs watched her with sympathetic eyes. At the same time, one of the factory foremen came into the office and put an envelope into Mavis's hand. She paid no attention to this last beyond stuffing it into a pocket of her frock. Her one concern was to reach the Broughton Road with as little delay as possible. Once outside the factory, she closely questioned the boy as he ran beside her, but he could tell her nothing beyond that Mrs Trivett had given him a penny to bring Mavis the note. When Mavis, breathless and faint, arrived at Mrs Trivett's gate, she saw two or three people staring curiously at the cottage. She all but fell against the door, and was at once admitted by Mrs Trivett.

"The worst! Let me know the worst!" gasped the terror-stricken girl.

Mavis was told that her baby was ill with diphtheria; also, that a broker's man was in possession at Mrs Trivett's.

"Will he get over it?" was Mavis's next question.

"It's for a lot of money. It's just on thirty pounds."

"I mean my boy."

"The doctor has hopes. He's coming in again presently."

Mavis hurried to the stairs leading to her bedroom. As she went up these, she brushed against a surly-looking man who was coming down. She rightly judged him to be the man in possession. She found the little sufferer stretched upon his bed of pain with wildly dilating eyes; it wrung Mavis's heart to see what difficulty he had with his breathing.

If she could only have done something to ease her baby's sufferings, she would have been better able to bear the intolerable suspense. She realised that she could do nothing till the doctor paid his next visit.

But she had forgotten; one thing she could do: she could pray for divine a.s.sistance to the Heavenly Father who was able to heal all earthly ills. This she did. Mavis prayed long and earnestly, with words that came from her heart. She told Him how she had endured pain, sorrow, countless debasing indignities without murmuring; if only in consideration of these, she begged that the life of her little one might be spared.

Whilst thus engaged, Mavis heard a tap at the door. She got up impatiently as she called to whomsoever it might be to enter.

Mrs Trivett came in with many apologies for disturbing Mavis. She then told her lodger that the broker's man was aware of the illness from which Mavis's baby was suffering; also that, as he was a family man, he objected to being in a house where there was a contagious disease, and that, if the child were not removed to the local fever hospital by the evening, he would inform the authorities. Mrs Trivett's information spelt further trouble for Mavis. Apart from her natural disinclination to confide her dearly loved child to the care of strangers, she saw a direct menace to herself should the man carry out his threat of insisting on the removal of the child. Montague Devitt was much bound up with the town's munic.i.p.al authorities. In this capacity, it was conceivable that he might discover the ident.i.ty of the child's mother; failing this, her visits to the hospital to learn the child's progress would probably excite comment, which, in a small town like Melkbridge, could easily be translated into gossip that must reach the ears of the Devitt family. The cloud of trouble hung heavily over Mavis.

"Can't--can't anything be done?" she asked desperately.

"It's either the hospital or paying the broker."

"How much is it?"

"Twenty-nine pounds sixteen."

"That's easily got," remarked Mavis. "At once?" asked Mrs Trivett, as her worn face brightened.

"I don't suppose I could get it till the morrow. It would be then too late?"

"But if you're sure of getting it, something might be arranged."

"Would the man take my word?"

"No. But he might know someone who would lend the money in a way that would be convenient."

"See him at once. Find out if anything can be done," urged the distracted mother.

Five minutes later, whilst Mavis was waiting in suspense, Mrs Trivett came up to say that the doctor had come again. Mavis had no time to ask her landlady what she had done with the broker's man, as the doctor came into the room directly after he had been announced. He was quite a young doctor, on whom the manners of an elderly man sat incongruously.

He glanced keenly at Mavis as he bowed to her; then, without saying a word, he fell to examining the child's throat.

"Well?" asked Mavis breathlessly, when he had satisfied himself of its condition.

"I must ask you a few questions," replied the doctor.

"What do you wish to know?" she asked with anxious heart.

He asked her much about the baby's place of birth, subsequent health and diet.

When Mavis told him of the Pimlico supplied milk, which she had sterilised herself, he shook his head.

"That accounts for the whole trouble," he remarked. "You should have fed him yourself."

"It didn't agree with him, and then it went away," Mavis told him.

"Ah, you had worry?"

"A bit. Do you think he'll pull through?"

"I'll tell you more to-night," he informed her.

Mavis attracted men. The doctor, not being blind to her fascinations, was not indisposed to linger for a moment's conversation, after he had treated the baby's throat, during which Mavis thought it necessary to tell him the old story of the husband in America who was preparing a home for her.

"Some chap's been low enough to land that charming girl with that baby," thought the doctor as he walked home. "She's as innocent as they make 'em, otherwise she wouldn't have told me that silly husband yarn.

If she were an old hand, she'd have kept her mouth shut."

Meanwhile, Mavis had been summoned downstairs to a conference, in which the broker's man (his name was Gunner), Mrs Trivett, and a man named Hutton, whom Mr Trivett had fetched, took part.