The Empty Sack Part 57

They discussed this topic in a desultory way, not so much letting it drop as pursuing it each in his own thought. Teddy picked up the line again after an interval of time, and some distance farther on.

"I suppose you can't believe that you come to a place where you know you're through and are in a hurry to get on. Well, you do. I guess old people like ma reach there, anyhow; and young people, too, when they're-when they're like me. I've had my shot-and I've miffed it. Now I'm all on edge to have another try. I'm so crazy about that that the thing that's to happen first doesn't seem anything-very much."

The hours wore on, but it seemed to Bob a night to which there was no time. Though the support he brought to Teddy was merely that of companionship, he felt that the boy was outstripping him. In Teddy's own phrase, he was "moving on," but moving on very fast. Bob couldn't tell how he knew this; he only felt himself being left behind. Teddy was quite right; his old experiment _was_ over, and some of the exaltation of the new one was already breaking through. That was the meaning of his silences, his abstractions. That was why he came out of each such spell with a smile that grew more luminous.

The Italian and the negro fell asleep. The four guards talked less to one another. Clutching the bar grew tiring. Brannigan, one of Teddy's guards, brought up a chair, offering it to Bob.

"Why don't you sit down? It'll be quite a while yet."

Bob took the chair, Teddy the one inside the cell. Bringing it as close to the bars as possible, he thrust his fingers through the opening to touch Bob's hand. Bob closed the fingers within his palm, and so held them.

"I'm not going to send any message to ma and the girls. They know I love them. You can't add anything to that." A sidelong smile stole through the bars. "I love you too, Bob. I guess it's a b.u.m thing to say, but to-night-well, it's different-and I'm going to say it. I can't do anything to thank you; but it may mean something to you to have me loving you like the devil all the way from-from over there."

"It means something to me now."

"Then that's all right."

The Italian breathed heavily. The negro snored. The guards were bored and somnolent. Teddy might have been asleep except for the look and the smile that every now and then crept through the bars toward his companion.

Suddenly he pulled his fingers from Bob's clasp, jumped to his feet, and held out his arms.

"All right, ma! I'm ready!"

The cry was so loud and joyous that Bob sprang up. Brannigan lumbered forward.

"Been dreamin'," he explained. "Just as well if he has."

Teddy looked about him in bewilderment.

"No, I haven't been. I wasn't asleep. I was wide awake. I guess you'll think I'm dippy, Bob; but I did see ma. 'Pon my soul I did! She was right there." He pointed to the spot. "She looked lovely, too-young, like-and yet it was ma all right. She wanted me to come. That's why I jumped. Oh, well! Perhaps I _am_ dippy. But it's funny, isn't it?"

He was so preoccupied with this happening as not to notice sounds in the outer pa.s.sage and beyond the yellow door. Even when he did, it was with no more than a partial cognizance.

"Listen!" he said once. "There they are. It'll be only a few minutes now. I'm not going to let you go in there, Bob. Funny about ma, isn't it?"

The sounds grew louder. The guards were moving about. Behind the yellow door people seemed to enter. There was the sc.r.a.ping of chairs as they sat down. The Italian woke and howled dismally. The negro shouted his hymn. Teddy was far away on the wings of speculation; but he came back to say:

"If ma had gone ahead of me, I know she'd like nothing better than to come and give me a lift over. But she hasn't gone ahead of me. She's over there in Indiana Avenue. That's the funny part of it. What do you suppose it means?"

Bob didn't know. Neither had he time to offer an opinion, because the main door opened and the warden appeared, accompanied by the chaplain, the doctor, the princ.i.p.al keeper, and three other men whom Teddy didn't know.

"Here they are!" Teddy whispered, as if their coming was a relief.

The warden advanced to the central cell. The door was unlocked. Teddy stood on the threshold.

"Thank you, warden. I suppose I can say good-by to my friend?"

Permission was given. Teddy stepped out into the corridor.

"You'd better go now, Bob. No use in your staying any longer." He nodded toward the men standing round him. "They'll handle me gently. I'm not afraid."

Their hands clasped; but the boy was only a boy, loving and in need of love. Before Bob knew what was happening, Teddy's arms were about his neck, in a long, desperate embrace.

A gulp that was almost a sob from each-and it was over.

"All right, boys. I'm ready. Go to it."

The words were spoken steadily. Bob limped toward the door. A guard unlocked it.

"Say, Bob!" It was Teddy's voice again. Bob turned. The lad had taken off his collar, no more conscious of the act than if he was going to bed. One of the strange men was kneeling on one knee, making a significant slit in a leg of Teddy's trousers. "Say, Bob! I wonder-if it doesn't take you too far out of your way-if you'd mind driving round by the house? You see, if anything has happened to ma, why, the girls'll be all up in the air, poor things!"

Bob nodded because he couldn't trust himself to words-and so it was the end.

Out in the air it seemed to him as if he had dreamed and waked up. The May night was so exquisite, so hallowing, that the walls of Bitterwell were mellow and enchanted against the dome of stars. Even in these grim courts the scent of growing things was sweet.

Driving in the deadest hours of night over the long flat road, he was too tired to think. His imagination didn't try to follow Teddy, because it had become an instinct to spring to the need to "carry on." Teddy was behind him. There were other things in front; and his mind was already with them.

And yet not actively. After he had slept he would be able to take them up; but just now his main desire was to get home to bed. Nothing but that would dispel this overweight of emotion.

Along the familiar road he drove mechanically. Even Teddy's last request, though it formed an intention, was hardly in his mind. At Bond's Corner, where the roads forked, to the right to Pemberton Heights, to the left to the bridge that would take him over toward Marillo, he was so nearly asleep that he might have gone straight on homeward had he not been startled by seeing a man and a woman standing in the middle of the road.

He jammed down the service and emergency brakes, swinging to the right.

The fact that they stood facing him without getting out of his way both amazed him and rendered him indignant. Turning to look at so strange a pair of pedestrians, he saw-Teddy and his mother.

They were not quite on the road, but a little above it. Neither were they in the dark like other things around, but shining with a light of their own. Neither were they shadowy apparitions, but definite, vital, forcible. They were dressed as he had generally seen them, and yet they wore a kind of radiance. The mother's arm was over her boy's shoulder, but Teddy was waving his hand. Smiles were on both faces, on the lips, in the eyes, and somehow in the personality.

Bob was not frightened, but he was thrilled. It seemed to him that they stayed long enough to overcome all the doubts of his senses. Though he pressed on the brakes, the car went a number of yards before he could bring it to a standstill; and yet they never left his side. They didn't exactly move; they were only there-living, lovely, sending out love as if it had been light, wrapping him round and round. It was so vivid, so much a fact, that when the car stopped and he saw no one there, he was amazed once more to find himself alone.

He couldn't drive on at once. He lingered-staring at the spot where they had stood, looking over the wide, dim country, gazing up at the stars in their yearning infinitude. He tried to persuade himself that his own mind had projected something unreal in itself; but he couldn't throw off the extraordinary happiness the vision left behind it.

Before reaching Indiana Avenue he had decided on a course. If there were no lights in the house, he would drive on homeward. If there were he would stop. At this hour in the very early morning, unless something unusual had happened, there would of course be none.

But there were lights. At sound of his approach, Pansy gave a little silvery yelp. Jennie opened the door before he had time to ring.

"Come in, Bob. I saw your car from the window."

In the living-room Gussie and Gladys, wearing their dressing-gowns, cried out their relief at seeing him. It was the situation Teddy had foreseen, in which they were all "up in the air." As usual, Gladys was the spokesman.

"Oh, Bob, we're so glad to have you. We didn't know what to do. Momma-"

A sob stopped her, but Jennie was more calm.

"Momma's gone, Bob. Gussie went into her room about half past ten to take her the gla.s.s of milk we always put by her bed, and she was asleep."

They gathered round him as if he formed their rallying point. He took Jennie and Gussie each by the hand. Gladys held his coat by the lapel.

"You're not sorry, any of you, are you? She wanted to go; and she's gone in the sweetest of all ways."