Black is White 48

Black is White 48

Slowly Frederic’s eyes opened again. They wavered from one face to the

other and there was in them the unsolvable mystery of divination. As the

lids drooped once more, Brood’s manner underwent a tremendous change.

The stupefaction of horror and doubt fell away in a flash and he was

again the clear--headed, indomitable man of action. The blood rushed

back into his veins, his eyes flashed with the returning fire of hope,

his voice was steady, sharp, commanding.

 

“The doctor!” he cried in Yvonne’s ear, as his strong fingers went out

to tear open the shirt-bosom. “Be quick! Send for Hodder; we must save

him.” She did not move. He whirled upon her fiercely. “Do as I tell you!

Are you so-----”

 

“Dr Hodder is on the way now,” she said dully.

 

His hands ceased their operations as if checked by a sudden paralysis.

 

“On the way here?” he cried incredulously. “Why------”

 

“He is coming,” she said fiercely. “I sent for him. Don’t stop now, be

quick! You know what to do. Stanch the flow of blood. Do something, man!

You have seen men with mortal wounds, and this man _must_ be saved!”

 

He worked swiftly, deftly, for he did know what to do. He had worked

over men before with wounds in their breasts, and he had seen them

through the shadow of death. But he could not help thinking, as he now

worked, that he was never known to miss a shilling at thirty paces.

 

She was speaking. Her voice was low, with a persistent note of

accusation in it.

 

“It was an accident, do you understand? You did not shoot to kill him.

The world shall never know the truth, unless he dies, and that is not to

happen. You are safe. The law cannot touch you, for I shall never speak.

This is between you and me. Do you understand?”

 

He glanced at her set, rigid face.

 

“Yes. It was an accident. And this is between you and me. We shall

settle it later on. Now I see you as you are--as Yvonne. I--wonder------”

His hand shook with a sudden spasm of indecision. He had again caught

that baffling look in her dark eyes.

 

“Attend!” she cried, and he bent to the task again. “He is not going to

die. It would be too cruel if he were to die now and miss all the joy of

victory over you, his lifelong foe. He------”

 

The door opened behind them and they looked up to see the breathless

Hindu. He came straight to the woman.

 

“He comes. Ranjab has obey. I have told him that the revolver was

discharge accidentally, by myself, by the unhappy son of a dog, I. It is

well. Ranjab is but a dog. He shall die to--day and his lips be sealed

for ever. Have no fear. The dead shall be silent.” His voice trailed off

into a whisper, for his eyes were looking into hers. “No,” he whispered,

after a moment, “no; the dead are not silent. One who is dead has spoken

to Ran jab.”

 

“Hush!” said the woman. Brood’s hands were shaking again, shaking and

uncertain. “The doctor? He comes?”

 

“Even now,” said the Hindu, turning toward the door.

 

Dr Hodder came blinking into the room. A gaping assistant from his

office across the street followed close behind, carrying a box of

instruments.

 

“Turn up the lights,” said the surgeon crisply. It seemed hours before

the soft glow was at its full and the room bathed in its mellow light.

All this time not a word was uttered. “Ah!” exclaimed Dr Hodder at

last. “Now we’ll see.”

 

He was kneeling beside Frederic an instant later.

 

“Bad!” he said after a single glance. “Wiley, get busy now. Clear that

table, Ranjab. Water, quick, Wiley. Lively, Ranjab. Shove ‘em off, don’t

waste time like that. Ah, now lend a hand, both of you. Easy! So!” Three

strong, nerveless pairs of hands raised the inert figure.

 

“Hello! What’s this?” The incomprehensible Hindu in his ruthless

clearing of the table had left the revolver lying where Yvonne had

placed it. “Good Lord, take it away! It’s done enough damage already.”

It was Wiley, the assistant, who picked it up gingerly and laid it on

a chair near by. “Now, where’s the butler? Send for an ambulance,

and--you, Wiley, call up the hospital and say------”

 

“No!” came in Yvonne’s husky, imperative voice. “No, not the hospital.

He is not to be taken away.”

 

“But, madam, you------”

 

“I insist! It is not to be thought of, Dr Hodder. He must remain in this

house. I will get his room ready for him. He is--to--stay--here!”

 

“Well, we’ll see,” said the surprised surgeon, and forthwith put her out

of his mind.

 

James Brood was standing stock--still and rigid in the centre of the

room. He had not moved an inch from the position he had taken when the

doctor pushed him aside in order to clear the way to the table. Yvonne

came straight to him. The matter of half a yard separated them as she

stopped and spoke to him, her voice so low that the bustling doctor

could not have distinguished a word.

 

“You owe it to Frederic to allow Ranjab’s story to stand. There is no

one to dispute it. I command you to protect the good name of your son.

That weapon was accidentally discharged by your servant, and you will

have to swear to it, James Brood, if called upon to do so, for I shall

swear to it, and Ranjab, too.”

 

“I shall conceal nothing,” he groaned. “Do you think I am a craven

coward as well as a------”

 

“Nevertheless, you will do as I command. He is going to live. That is

why I demand it of you. If he were to die--well, even then you would not

be permitted to speak. I shall stand here beside you, James Brood, and

if you utter one word to contradict Ranjab’s story I shall shoot you

down. Can you not see how desperately in earnest I am?” She reached over

and caught up the revolver from the chair as she was speaking.

 

For a full minute they looked into each other’s eyes, and he--the

strong, invulnerable Brood--was the first to give way. The steely

glitter faded before the swift rush of a new feeling that swept over

him--an extraordinary feeling of tenderness toward this woman who fought

him with something more than her own cause at stake.

 

“I understand. You are right. If he gets well, this beastly thing must

never be known. We will leave it to him. If he chooses to tell the

truth, then------”

 

“I have your promise-_now?_” she demanded intensely.

 

“Yes. Now go!” Involuntarily he straightened his tall figure and pointed

toward the door.

 

“He is not to be removed from this house,” she insisted.

 

“Ten minutes ago you were suggesting a different------” he began

sneeringly.

 

“The whole world has changed since then, James Brood,” she said, and her

shoulders drooped. Almost instantly she recovered her poise. “I have a

great deal to say to you later on.”

 

“Not a great deal,” he said meaningly.

 

He saw her flinch and was conscious of a curious pang, a poignant yet

indefinable pang of remorse.

 

She went swiftly from the room. He looked for the revolver. It was gone.

Somehow he found himself wondering if she had taken it away with her in

the fear that he would turn it against himself in case-----

 

“No powder stains,” he heard Hodder saying to his assistant. “Not a sign

of’em.”

 

“That’s right,” said the assistant, shaking his head.

 

“Couldn’t have been--no, of course not,” went on the first speaker in a

matter--of--fact tone.

 

“Doesn’t look that way,” agreed the assistant.

 

“Fired from some little distance, I’d say.”

 

“Fifteen or twenty feet, perhaps.”

 

It suddenly dawned upon Brood that they were talking of suicide.

 

“Good Heaven, Hodder, it--it wasn’t _that!_” he cried hoarsely. “What

right have you to doubt my word? I tell you I------”

 

“Your word, Jim? This is the first word you’ve spoken since I came into

the room.”

 

“Is--is it a mortal wound?” broke from the other’s lips.

 

“Can’t tell. First aid now, that’s the point. We’ll get him downstairs

in a few minutes. More light. I can’t see a thing in this--hello! What’s

this? A photograph? Fell out of his pocket when I--oh, I see! Your wife.

Sorry I got blood on it.” He laid the small bit of pasteboard on the

table. “Wiley! See if you can get a mattress. We’ll move him at once.

Lively, my lad. He’s alive, all right, Jim. Do our best. Looks bad. Poor

kid. He’s not had a very happy life of it, I’m afraid--I beg pardon!”

 

In considerable embarrassment he brought his comments to an end and bent

lower to examine the small black hole in the left breast of his patient.

 

Frederic’s lips moved. The doctor’s ear caught the strangled whisper

that issued.

 

“Curious,” he remarked, turning to Brood with something like awe in his

eyes. “I’m sure he said ‘Mother.’ But he never knew his mother, did he?”

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER XX

 

Hours afterward Brood sat alone in the room where the tragedy occurred.

Much had transpired in the interim to make those hours seem like

separate and distinct years to him, each hour an epoch in which a vital

and memorable i