style="font-size:15px;"> Many a friendly voice whispered at the door, “How is he?” The Irish waiters crossed themselves and stept softly through the hall, as they went on their hasty errands; and many a consultation was held among warm-hearted gentlemen friends, (who had made Harry’s acquaintance at the hotel, during the pleasant summer,) to decide which should first prove their friendship by watching with him.
Ruth declined all these offers to fill her place. “I will never leave him,” she said; “his reason may return, and his eye seek vainly for me. No – no; I thank you all. Watch with me, if you will, but do not ask me to leave him.”
In the still midnight, when the lids of the kind but weary watchers drooped heavily with slumber, rang mournfully in Ruth’s ear the sad-plaint of Gethsemane’s Lord, “Could ye not watch with me one hour?” and pressing her lips to the hot and fevered hand before her, she murmured, “I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.”
CHAPTER XXVII
“Have you got the carpet-bag, doctor? and the little brown bundle? and the russet-trunk? and the umberil? and the demi-john, and the red band-box, with my best cap in it? one – two – three – four; yes – that’s all right. Now, mind those thievish porters. Goodness, how they charge here for carriage hire! I never knew, before, how much money it took to journey. Oh dear! I wonder if Harry is worse? There now, doctor, you’ve put your foot right straight through that band-box. Now, where, for the land’s sake, are my spectacles? ’Tisn’t possible you’ve left them behind? I put them in the case, as you stood there in the chayna closet, drinking your brandy and water, and asked you to put them in your side-pocket, because my bag was full of orange-peels, scissors, camphor, peppermint-drops, and seed-cakes. I wouldn’t have left ’em for any money. Such a sight of trouble as it was to get them focussed right to my eyes. How could you, doctor, be so blundering? I declare it is enough to provoke a saint.”
“If that’s the case, there’s no immediate call for you to get vexed,” said the doctor, tartly.
“Is that the house?” asked the old lady, her curiosity getting the better of her indignation; “what a big hotel! I wonder if Harry is worse? Mercy me, I’m all of a quiver. I wonder if they will take us right into the drawing-room? I wonder if there’s many ladies in it – my bonnet is awfully jammed: beside, I’m so powdered with dust, that I look as if I had had an ash barrel sifted over me. Doctor! doctor! don’t go on so far ahead. It looks awk’ard, as if I had no protector.”
“How’s Harry?” said the doctor, to a white-jacketted waiter, who stood gossipping on the piazza steps with a comrade.
“Funny old chap!” said the waiter, without noticing the doctor’s query; “I say, Bill, look how his hair is cut!”
“’Taint hair,” said Tom, “it is a wig.”
“Bless my eyes! so it is; and a red one, too! Bad symptoms; red wigs are the cheapest; no extra fees to be got out of that customer, for blacking boots and bringing hot beafsteaks. Besides, just look at his baggage; you can always judge of a traveler, Bill, by his trunks; it never fails. Now, I like to see a trunk thickly studded with brass nails, and covered with a linen overall; then I know, if it is a lady’s, that there’s diamond rings inside, and plenty of cash; if ’tis a gentleman’s, that he knows how to order sherry-cobblers in the forenoon, and a bottle of old wine or two with his dinner; and how to fee the poor fellow who brings it, too, who lives on a small salary, with large expectations.”
“How’s Harry?” thundered the doctor again, (after waiting what he considered a reasonable time for an answer,) “or if you are too lazy to tell, you whiskered jackanapes, go call your employer.”
The word “employer” recalled the rambling waiter to his senses, and great was his consternation on finding that “the old chap with the red wig” was the father of young Mr. Hall, who was beloved by everything in the establishment, down to old Neptune the house-dog.
“I told you so,” said the doctor, turning to his wife; “Harry’s no better – consultation this morning – very little hope of him; – so much for my not being here to prescribe for him. Ruth shouldered a great responsibility when she brought him away out of reach of my practice. You go into that room, there, Mis. Hall, No. 20, with your traps and things, and take off your bonnet and keep quiet, while I go up and see him.”
CHAPTER XXVIII
“Humph!” said the doctor, “humph!” as Ruth drew aside the curtain, and the light fell full upon Harry’s face. “Humph! it is all up with him; he’s in the last stage of the complaint; won’t live two days;” and stepping to the table, the doctor uncorked the different phials, applied them to the end of his nose, examined the labels, and then returned to the bed-side, where Ruth stood bending over Harry, so pallid, so tearless, that one involuntarily prayed that death, when he aimed his dart, might strike down both together.
“Humph!” said the doctor again! “when did he have his reason last?”
“A few moments, day before yesterday,” said Ruth, without removing her eyes from Harry.
“Well; he has been murdered, – yes murdered, just as much as if you had seen the knife put to his throat. That tells the whole story, and I don’t care who knows it. I have been looking at those phials, – wrong course of treatment altogether for typhoid fever; fatal mistake. His death will lie heavy at somebody’s door,” and he glanced at Ruth.
“Hush! he is coming to himself,” said Ruth, whose eyes had never once moved from her husband.
“Then I must tell him that his hours are numbered,” said the doctor, thrusting his hands in his pockets, and pompously walking round the bed.
“No, no,” whispered Ruth, grasping his arm with both hands; “you will kill him. The doctor said it might destroy the last chance for his life. Don’t tell him. You know he is not afraid to die; but oh, spare him the parting with me! it will be so hard; he loves me, father.”
“Pshaw!” said the doctor, shaking her off; “he ought to settle up his affairs while he can. I don’t know how he wants things fixed. Harry! Harry!” said he, touching his shoulder, “I’ve come to see you; do you know me?”
“Father!” said Harry, languidly, “yes, I’m – I’m sick. I shall be better soon; don’t worry about me. Where’s my wife? where’s Ruth?”
“You’ll never be better, Harry,” said the doctor, bluntly, stepping between him and Ruth; “you may not live the day out. If you have got anything to say, you’d better say it now, before your mind wanders. You are a dead man, Harry; and you know that when I say that, I know what I’m talking about.”
The sick man gazed at the speaker, as if he were in a dream; then slowly, and with a great effort, raising his head, he looked about the room for Ruth. She was kneeling at the bedside, with her face buried in her hands. Harry reached out his emaciated hand, and placed it upon her bowed head.
“Ruth? wife?”
Her arm was about his neck in an instant – her lips to his; but her eyes were tearless, and her whole frame shook convulsively.
“Oh, how can I leave you? who will care for you? Oh God, in mercy spare me to her;” and Harry fell back on his pillow.
The shock was too sudden; reason again wandered; he heard the shrill whistle of the cars, recalling
