"Good-bye, Jenny Blair," George had called as he stood on the platform. "Good-bye, Jenny Blair, will you look after my mint bed?"
Though she did not reply by a glance, she knew, without seeing him, how attractive he looked, and how young for his forty-odd years. She knew how fresh and gay he always seemed on a summer morning, with the ruddiness of health in his face and the mockery in his near-sighted eyes narrowing down to an imperative flash. "I know he's old," she thought, "but I don't mind. I don't mind about anything. He will be back in three days. I have only three days to wait." She did not ask herself for what she was waiting. Beyond the glowing sweetness of the present there was a virgin wilderness of mystery and delight. "Three days," she repeated, "three days are not long. In three days he will be back in Queenborough, and then I may see him. Even though I never speak to him, I shall be able to see him again." Then, as the train moved out of the station, she raised her head and looked after him, with eyes that were grave, questioning, unabashed, and eager for life. She looked after him until, smiling back at her, his figure melted, with the flying train, into the blue distance.
"What do you think of her this morning?" General Archbald inquired of John, as they turned away and walked back through the station. "Do you feel easy?"
For an instant John hesitated; then he parried defiantly, "Do you, General?"
The old man flinched. "I was shocked to see her," he replied, and pressed down on his walking-stick.
"Well, you had seen her only in bed. She always looks better in bed. I hope," he added briskly, "this change will be the very thing that she needs."
"It may be," the old man assented, and then, as John did not speak, he continued in a troubled tone, "There is a look in her face I don't like. I had never seen it until to-day. The look of defeat."
"So you've noticed that. Yes, I can't understand it. But then, one never knows everything."
"I've seen that look often before, but there was always some cause I could explain. I saw it in many faces after the war, and in many more faces while Reconstruction lasted. But those were times that shattered men's nerves."
"I don't know and I refuse to guess," John said slowly. "If I did guess, I should put it down to the long strain, the unnatural life she has led. She was not meant for poverty and insecurity, and yet she has had both." He shook his head as if he were trying to rid himself of a gnat. "Yes, I hope this change will be the very thing that she needs."
When they reached his car, General Archbald climbed in with an uncertain step, and put his arm about his grand-daughter, who had not spoken a word since she had watched the departing train. His knees were still shaking from the effort to walk straight without help.
"Will you go up with us, John?"
"No, thank you, General, I must rush off to the hospital. Jenny Blair is looking well, isn't she? Or is it that pink lining under her hat?"
Turning to glance at the girl, as the car moved away, the old man was startled by the change in her expression. What was the meaning? he asked himself. Was it only the pink lining under the transparent brim of her hat? Or had she sprung up in a night with the dew on her freshness? The tender contour of her features was still empty; but there was a burnished glow on her skin and hair, a richer and deeper gloss, as if some shining fluid saturated her body. Yet her eyes, more golden than hazel in their dark setting, were unabashed and exultant beneath the shallows of innocence.
"Are you all right, my child?" he asked, pricked by an uneasy presentiment. "Nothing is wrong, is there?"
"Oh, nothing." She seemed to be waking from sleep.
"You look unusually well, but you seem quiet."
"I've been thinking--" She broke off, suppressed a yawn as she looked out of the window, and left her sentence unfinished.
"Did John depress you? Are you anxious about Mrs. Birdsong?"
"Oh, yes!" She grasped the idea with eagerness. "I am dreadfully anxious about Mrs. Birdsong."
"Well, you must remember that all young physicians are inclined to be serious."
"But she looked so ill, Grandfather. I heard old Aunt Betsey tell Berry this morning that death was in her look. She hadn't seen her since she left the hospital. You know Aunt Betsey went to live in Goochland after she got too old to work."
"She ought not to have said that." The General was disturbed, and he showed it. "That's pure superstition. Coloured people see entirely too much."
"Yes, I know." Jenny Blair sighed and looked at the houses they were passing. "Oh, Grandfather, I do hope she will get well!" she said passionately, after a long pause. "I couldn't bear it if anything happened to her!"
"Naturally we feel anxious, my darling, but we have every reason to hope."
"I couldn't bear it if she were never to look like herself again. I couldn't bear it."
So that was the trouble! How unjust it was that youth should be condemned to bear so many vicarious burdens. As one grew older and age hardened the imagination, as well as the arteries, a comfortable numbness protected the heart and the senses alike.
"There, there, my dear," he said, patting her hand; and he repeated gently, while a tear stole over the violet pouch beneath his bad eye, which had lost that last amenity of civilization, the power to control emotion, "We have every reason to hope."
"John seemed," she hesitated for a word, "so angry about—about everything. He talked to me yesterday just as if somebody or something had injured him."
"He is young yet, and most young minds think, if they think at all, with a sense of injury. He wants to blame something, but he has lost his bearing and can't decide where the blame ought to rest. I know that because I went through it myself. That is why I am thankful that age has closed, like the shell of a clam, over my nobler impulses. I can't fight for lost causes, I can scarcely condemn successful causes, any longer."
"But, Grandfather, life is so beautiful."
"I hope you will always find it so."
For a moment she was silent; then she asked in an agitated voice, "Do you suppose she still cares so much, Grandfather?"
"Cares, my dear?"
"I mean," the words were spoken with a stammer, as if she were overcoming an impediment in her speech or her mind. "I mean Mrs. Birdsong. Do you think she still cares as much as she used to care?"
"For her husband? Why, of course she does. Have you any reason to think otherwise?"
"No, no reason in the world. Only I wondered. Can you see why she ever fell so madly in love?"
"You asked me that once before. No, my child, one is never able to see a reason in love. But do you really dislike George? Has he done anything to annoy you? If he has," the thick eyebrows beetled angrily, "I'll speak to him as soon as he returns."
"No, no." She looked at him with terror, a look that reminded him of a rabbit. "He hasn't done anything. He doesn't take any notice of me. But I can't abide him. I wish I never had to see him again as long as I live."