Waltz Into Darkness (9 page)

A
strange, almost complete silence had succeeded it.

Then
the rolling, somehow-undulating sound usually produced by total
immersion in a body of water.

After
that only an occasional watery ripple.

Aunt
Sarah returned, stopped en route to shake out and inspect a fleecy
towel, also warmed by courtesy of the kitchen stove, that she was
taking in with her. She went on into the bedroom.

"Hullo
there," he heard her say, from in there. "How my bird? How
my yallo baby ?" Suddenly her voice deepened to strident
urgency. "Mr. Lou! Mr. Lou !"

He
went in running.

"He
dead."

"He
can't be. He was singing only a minute ago."

"He
dead, I tell you! Look here, see for yourself--" She had removed
him from the cage, was holding him pillowed on the palm of her hand.

"Maybe
he needs water and seed again, like that last--" But the two
receptacles were filled; Aunt Sarah had made that her responsibility
ever since then.

"It
ain't that."

She
gave the edge of her hand a slight dip.

Something
dropped over the edge of it, hung there suspended, while the body of
the bird remained in position.

"His
neck's done been broken."

"Maybe
he fell off the perch--" Durand tried to suggest inanely, for
lack of any other explanation that came to mind.

She
scowled at him belligerently.

"They
don't fall! What they got wings for?"

He
repeated: "But he was singing only a few minutes ago--"

"What
he was a few minutes ago and what he is now is two different things!"

"--and
no one's been in here. No one but you and Miss Julia--"

In
the silence, and incredibly, Julia could be heard in the adjoining
bathroom, lightly whistling a bar or two to herself.

Then,
as though belatedly realizing how unladylike she was guilty of being,
she checked herself, and the water gave a playful little splash for
finale.

13

It
was quite by chance that he happened to go through the street in
which his former lodgings were. He had no concern with them, would
have passed them by with no more than a glance of fond recollection;
his errand and his destination lay elsewhere entirely, and it only
happened that this was the shortest way to it.

And
it was equally by chance that Madame Tellier, his erstwhile landlady,
happened to come out and stand for a moment in the entrance just as
he was in the act of walking by.

She
greeted him effusively, with shrieks of delight that could be heard
for doors away in either direction, flung her arms about him like a
second mother, asked about his health, his happiness, his enjoyment
of married life.

"Oh,
but we miss you, Louis! Your old rooms are rented again--to a pair of
cold Northerners (I charge them double)--but it's not the same."
She creased her rather large nose distastefully. Suddenly she was all
alight again, gave her fingers a crackling snap of selfreminder. "I
just remembered! I have a letter waiting for you. It's been here
several days now, and I haven't seen Tom since it came, to ask where
your new address is, or I would have forwarded it. He still comes
around now and then to work for me, you know. Wait here, I'll bring
it out to you."

She
patted him three times in rapid succession on the chest, as if
cajoling him to stand patiently as he was for a moment, turned and
whisked inside.

He
had, he only now recalled rather ruefully, completely overlooked
having his mailing address changed from here, his old quarters, to
the new house on St. Louis Street, when he made the move. Not that it
was vitally important; his business mail all continued to go to the
office, as it always had, and of personal correspondence he had never
had a great deal, only his courtship letters with Julia, now brought
to a happy termination. He would stop by the post office, on his way
home, and file the new delivery instructions, if only for the sake of
an occasional stray missive such as this.

Meanwhile
she had come back with it. "Here ! Isn't it good you just
happened to come by this way?"

He
gave the inscription a brief glance, simply to confirm it, as he took
it from her. "Mr. Louis Durand," in spidery penmanship; the
three capitals, M, L, and D, standing out in black enlargement, the
minuscule letters too finely traced and too diminished in size to
make for legibility. However, it was his own name, there could be no
mistaking that, so he questioned it no further; thrust it carelessly
into the side pocket of his coat for later reference and promptly
forgot about it.

Their
leavetaking was as exclamatory and enthusiastic as their greeting had
been. She kissed him on the forehead in a sort of maternal
benediction, waved him steadily on his way for a distance of the
first three or four succeeding house-lengths, even touched her apron
to the corner of her eye before at last turning to go inside. She
wept easily, this Madame Tellier; wept with only a single glassful of
wine, or at sight of any once-familiar face. Even those she had once
ruthlessly evicted for non-payment of rent.

He
accomplished his errand, he returned to his office, he absorbed
himself once more in the daily routine of his work.

He
discovered the letter a second time only within the last quarter of
an hour before leaving to go home, and as equally by accident as it
had been thrust upon him in the first place by happening to thrust
his hand blindly into his pocket, in search of a pocket handkerchief.

Reminded
of its presence, he rested himself for a moment by taking it out,
tearing it open, and leaning back to read it. No sooner had his eyes
fallen on the introductory words than he stopped again, puzzled.

"My
own dearest Julia :"

It
was for her, not himself.

He
turned to the envelope again, looked at it more closely than he had
on the street in presence of Madame Tellier. He saw then what had
misled him. The little curl, following the "Mr." so tiny as
almost to escape detection, was meant for an "s."

He
went back to the paper once more; turned this over, glanced at the
bottom of its reverse side.

"Your
ever-loving and distressed Bertha."

It
was from her sister, in St. Louis.

"Distressed."
The word seemed to cast itself up at him, like a barbed fishhook,
catch onto and strain at his attention. He could not pry it off
again.

He
did not intend to read any further. It was her letter, after all.

Somehow
the opening words held him trapped, he could not stop once they had
seized his eyes with their meaning.

My
own dearest Julia:

I cannot understand why you treat me thus. Surely I deserve

better
than this of you. It is three weeks now since you have left

me,
and in all that time not a word from you. Not so much as the

briefest
line, to tell me of your safe arrival, whether you met Mr.

Durand,
whether the marriage has taken place or not. Julia, you

were
never like this before. What am I to think? Can you not

imagine
the distracted state of mind this leaves me in--

14

He
waited until after they were through their supper to speak of it, and
then only in the mildest, least reproachful way.

He
took it out and gave it to her, after they had entered the sitting
room from the dining room, and settled themselves there, she across
the lamplit table from him. "This came for you today. I opened
it by mistake, not noticing. I hope you'll forgive me."

She
took the whole envelope first, and studied it a second, this way and
that. "Who's it from ?" she said.

"Can't
you tell?"

Just
as he was about to wonder why the script in itself did not tell her
that, she had already withdrawn its contents and opened them, and
murmured "Oh," so the question never had a chance to form
itself in his mind. But whether the "Oh" meant recognition
of its sender or merely recognition of the nature of the letter, or
even something else quite different, there was no way for him to
distinguish.

She
read it rather quickly, even hurriedly, her head moving with each
line, then back again, in continuous serried little twitchings. Then
reached the bottom and had done.

He
thought he saw remorse on her face, in its sudden, still abstraction,
that held for a moment after.

"She
says--" She half-tendered it to him. "Did you read it?"

"Yes,
I did," he said, slightly uncomfortable.

She
put it back in the envelope, gave the latter two taps where its seam
was broken.

He
looked at her fondly, to soften the insistence of his appeal. "Write
to her, Julia," he urged. "That is not like you at all."

"I
will," she promised contritely. "Oh, I will, Louis, without
fail." And twisted her hands a little, about themselves, and
looked down at them as she did so.

"But
why didn't you before now?" he continued gently. "I never
asked you, because I felt sure you had."

"Oh,
so much has happened--I meant to, time and again I meant to, and each
time there was something to take my mind off it. You see, Louis, this
has been the beginning of a whole new life for me, these past few
weeks, and everything seemed to come at one time--"

"I
know," he said. "But you will write?" And he took up
and lost himself in his newspaper.

"The
very first thing," she vowed.

Half
an hour went by. She was, now, turning the leaves of a heavy
ornamental album, regaling herself with the copperplate engravings,
snubbing the text.

He
watched her covertly from under lowered lids a moment. Presently he
cleared his throat as a reminder.

She
took no notice, went ahead, with childlike engrossment.

"You
said you would write to your sister."

She
looked slightly disconcerted. "I know. But must it be right
tonight? Why won't tomorrow do as well ?"

"Don't
you want to write to her?"

"Of
course I do, how can you ask that? But why must it be this instant?
Will tomorrow make such a difference ?"

He
put his newspaper aside. "A great deal in time of arrival, I'm
afraid. If you write it now, it can go off in the early morning post.
If you wait until tomorrow, it will be held over a full day longer;
she will have that much more anxiety to endure."

He
rose, closed the album for her, since she gave no signs of intending
to do this herself. Then he stopped momentarily, looked at her
searchingly to ask: "There's no ill-feeling between you, is
there? Some quarrel just before you left that you haven't told me
about?" And before she could speak, if she had meant to, put the
answer in her mouth. "She doesn't write as though there had
been."

The
lines of her throat, extended for an instant, dropped back again, as
if he'd aborted what she'd been about to say.

"How
you talk," she murmured. "We're devoted to one another."

"Well,
then, come. Why be stubborn? There's no time like the present. And
you have nothing to occupy yourself with, that I can see." He
took her by both hands and had to draw her to her feet. And though
she made no active sign of resistance, he could feel the weight of
her body against the direction of his pull.

He
had to go to the desk and lower the writing-slab. He had to draw out
a sheet of fresh notepaper from .the rack, and put it in place for
her, slightly tilted of corner.

He
had to go back and bring her over, from where she stood, by the hand.
Then even when he had her seated, he had to dip the pen and place it
in her very fingers. He gave her head a pat. "You are like a
stubborn child that doesn't want to do its lessons," he told her
humorously.