Vrouw Grobelaar and Her Leading Cases Part 19

"And here, with a voice as even as one who speaks on the traffic of every day, with a calm face, he poured forth an awful, a soul-wracking blasphemy.

"'Here!' cried the doctor, startled. 'Draw the line somewhere, Predikant. That sort of thing won't do at all, you know.'

"'Now let me see my wife,' said the Predikant; and after a while, when he had warned him very solemnly on the need for silence, the doctor took him in and showed him Paula, thin and shorn, sleeping with level breath. The Predikant looked on her with parted lips and clenched hands, and when he was outside again he turned to the doctor.

"' I value my soul,' he said simply. 'But it is worth it.'

"'I haven't a notion what you are gibbering about,'

answered the doctor, who had a gla.s.s in his hand. 'But there's long sleep and a dream killer in this tumbler, and you've to drink it.'

"'I need nothing,' said the Predikant, but at the doctor's urgency he drank the dose, and was soon in his bed and sleeping.

"Next day, when he was let in to Paula's bedside, she smiled and murmured at him, and nodded weakly when he spoke. The doctor warned him about noise.

"'We've won her back,' he explained, 'and she's going to do well. But she has had a hard time, and there's no denying she is very weak and ill. So if you go back to your bell-- ringing or any of those games you'll undo everything. She's to be kept quiet, do you hear?'

"'I hear,' answered the Predikant. 'There shall be stillness. Not that it matters for all your words, but there shall be stillness.'

"'I warn you,' retorted the doctor seriously, 'that it matters very much. You're off your axle, my friend, and I shall have to doctor you. But if I hear of any foolishness, Predikant or no Predikant, I'll have you locked up as sure as your name's Mostert.'

"He left him there, and started through the garden to his cart that stood in the road. On his way he stubbed his foot against something that lay on the earth--a great metal cup.

He picked it up.

"'I am not a heathen,' he said, as he brought it to the Predikant, 'and therefore a Communion-cup is no more to me than a sardine tin, when it is out of its place. I don't want to know what you were doing out here the other night, my friend; but you had better put this back in the Kerk before somebody misses it.'

"The Predikant took it from him, but said nothing.

"'And look here,' went on the doctor, 'it was my skill and knowledge that saved your wife. Nothing else. Good-day.'

"As he drove off, he saw the Predikant still standing on the stoop, the great cup, stained here and there with earth, in his hand.

"From that hour Paula mended swiftly. Even the doctor was surprised at the manner in which health sped back to her, and the young roses returned to her cheeks.

"'There's more than medicine in this,' he said one day. 'Do you know what it is, Predikant?'

"'Yes,' said the Predikant.

"'You do, eh? Well, it's clean young blood, my friend, and nothing else,' answered the doctor, watching him with a slight frown of shrewdness.

"The Predikant said nothing. For days there had been a kind of gloom on him, lit by a savage satisfaction in the betterment of his wife. His manner was like a midnight, in which a veld-fire glows far off. He had grown thinner, and his face was lean and gray, while in his eyes smouldered a spark that had no relation to joy or triumph.

"'Clean young blood,' repeated the doctor. 'No miracles, if you please.' He thought, you see, he had divined the Predikant's secret.

'I'm a man of science,' he went on, 'and when I come across a miracle I'll shut up shop.'

"Paula, from her pillows, heard them with a little wonder, and she was not slow to see the trouble and change in her husband's haunted face. So that night, when he came to say good-night to her, she drew his hand down to her breast, and searched for the seed of his woe.

"'You look so thin and ill, my dear,' she said gently. 'You have worried too much over me. You have paid too great a price for your wife.'

"She felt him tremble between her arms.

"'A great one,' he answered, 'but not too great.'

"'Not?' she smiled restfully, as he lifted his face from her bosom and looked into her eyes.

"'Never too great a price for you,' he said. 'Never that.'

"'My love!' she answered, and for a while they were silent together.

"Then she stirred. 'Do you know, John,' she said, 'that you and I have not prayed together since first this sickness took me? Shall we thank G.o.d together, now that He has willed to leave us our companionship for yet a s.p.a.ce?'

"'No!' he said quietly.

"'Dear!' She was surprised. 'I was asking you to thank G.o.d with me.'

"He nodded. 'I heard you, but it serves no purpose. G.o.d forgot us, Paula.'

"His eyes were like coals gleaming hotly.

"'I prayed,' he cried, 'and yet you slipped farther from me and nearer the grave. I strewed my soul in supplication, and there was talk of winding-sheets. And then, in the keen hour of decision, when you tilted in the balance, I sought elsewhere for aid; and while I defiled all holiness, ere yet I had finished the business, comes to me that doctor and tells me all is well. What think you of that, Paula?'

"She had heard him with no breaking of the little smile that lay on her lips--the little all-forgiving smile that is the heritage of mothers,--and now that he was done she smiled still.

"'I remember the old tales,' she answered.

"'How does the witch call the devil, John? Water in the Communion-cup, bread and blood and earth--is that it? and two circles--two, is it?'

"'Three,' he corrected.

"'Ah, yes; three.' She laughed soothingly, 'You poor muddled boy,' she murmured. 'Do you prize me so much, John?

Poor John. You must let me be wise for both of us, John. I am not afraid of the devil, at all events.'

"'Nor I,' he answered, 'so long as you are well.'

"'But I am getting well now,' she answered, 'And I do want you to pray with me, dear. Put your head down, dear, and let me whisper to you.'

"She soothed him gently and sweetly, b.u.t.tressing his weakness with her love. How can I know what she said or what he answered? She wrought upon him with the kind arts G.o.d gives a woman to pay her for being a woman, and soon she had softened something of the miserable madness that possessed him, and he kneeled beside the bed, sobbing rendingly, and prayed. Her hand lay on his head, and after a while, when the violence had pa.s.sed by, he was taken with a serene peace.

"He bade her good-night, tenderly.

"'Good-night,' she answered, 'and, John--I would that I could give you half of what you would have given for me.'

"As he went out at the door he saw her face smiling at him, with a great warmth of love and pity transfiguring it.

"'Nest morning, when the doctor came, he stayed near an hour in her room, and then came to the Predikant.

"'Just tell me,' he said to him,--'just tell me straight and short, what you did to your wife last night.'

"The Predikant told him in a few words what had pa.s.sed between them, while the doctor watched him and curled his lip.