“You—think he—could?”
whispered Elvira Gordon.
“’Tain’t for me to say,” replied
Margaret Bean. “He lays there—looks
most as if he was dead.” She wiped her
eyes hard, with a handkerchief so stiff that it looked
on that cold morning frozen as with old tears.
Margaret Bean was famous for her fine starching in
the village; it was her chief domestic talent, and
she was faithful in its application in all possible
directions.
“I wish he would speak if he could,” said
Mrs. Gordon.
“I do, if it’s for the best,” returned
Margaret Bean. She hesitated; there were red
rings around her tearful eyes, like a bird’s.
“I can’t believe your son did it, nohow,
Mis’ Gordon,” said she.
“I hope if my son is innocent he will be proved
so,” returned Elvira Gordon. She was too
proudly just herself not to use the word if,
and yet she could have slain the other woman for the
sly doubt and pity in her tone.
“It’s harder for you than ‘tis for
him, layin’ there,” said Margaret Bean,
nodding towards the house. There was an odd gratulation
of pity in her tone. She rubbed her eyes again.
“We all have our own burdens,” replied
Elvira, with a dignified motion, as if she straightened
herself under hers. “I hope he will be
able to speak—soon.”
“I hope so, if it’s for the best,”
said Margaret Bean.
Elvira Gordon had gone home hoping that Lot might
yet speak. She had heard his rattling cough as
she picked her way out of the icy yard, and Madelon
also heard it when she entered it. She knocked
at the side door, and Margaret Bean opened it.
She had a gruel cup in her hand.
“I want to see him,” said Madelon.
Margaret Bean looked at her. Her starched calico
apron flared out widely over her lank knees across
the doorway.
“I’m afraid he ain’t able to see
nobody this morning,” said she, and the asperity
in her tone was less veiled than usual. Her voice
was not so hoarse. She was mindful of this girl’s
former conduct at her master’s bedside, and
herself half believed her mad or guilty. A suspicious
imagination had Margaret Bean, and Madelon would have
found in her a much readier belief than in others.
“I’ve got to see him, whether he’s
able or not,” said Madelon.
“The doctor said—”
“I’m going to see him!”
Madelon pushed roughly in past the smooth apron and
ran through the entry to Lot’s room, with the
housekeeper staring after her in a helpless ruffle
of indignation.
“She’s gone in there,” she told
her husband, who appeared in the kitchen door, dish-towel
in hand. Margaret Bean’s husband always
washed the dishes and performed all the irresponsible
domestic duties of the establishment. He was
commonly adjudged not as smart as his wife, and little
store was set by his counsels. Indeed, at times
the only dignity of his man’s estate which seemed
left to this obediently pottering old body was the
masculine pronoun which necessarily expressed him
still. However, even in that the undisturbed use
was not allowed. “Margaret Bean’s
husband” was usually substituted for “He,”
and nothing left of him but the superior feminine element
feebly qualified by masculinity.
