They walked fast, when they got out into the rainy
dark, and it was hard to shelter Halleck as he limped
rapidly on. Marcia ran forward once, to see if
her baby were safely kept from the wet, and found that
Halleck had its little face pressed close between
his neck and cheek. “Don’t be afraid,”
he said. “I’m looking out for it.”
His voice sounded broken and strange, and neither
of them spoke again till they came in sight of Marcia’s
door. Then she tried to stop him. She put
her hand on his shoulder. “Oh, I’m
afraid—afraid to go in,” she pleaded.
He halted, and they stood confronted in the light
of a street lamp; her face was twisted with weeping.
“Why are you afraid?” he demanded, harshly.
“We had a quarrel, and I—I ran away—I
said that I would never come back. I left him—”
“You must go back to him,” said Halleck.
“He’s your husband!” He pushed on
again, saying over and over, as if the words were some
spell in which he found safety, “You must go
back, you must go back, you must go back!”
He dragged her with him now, for she hung helpless
on his arm, which she had seized, and moaned to herself.
At the threshold, “I can’t go in!”
she broke out. “I’m afraid to go
in! What will he say? What will he do?
Oh, come in with me! You are good,—and
then I shall not be afraid!”
“You must go in alone! No man can be your
refuge from your husband! Here!” He released
himself, and, kissing the warm little face of the sleeping
child, he pressed it into her arms. His fingers
touched hers under the shawl; he tore his hand away
with a shiver.
She stood a moment looking at the closed door; then
she flung it open, and, pausing as if to gather her
strength, vanished into the brightness within.
He turned, and ran crookedly down the street, wavering
from side to side in his lameness, and flinging up
his arms to save himself from falling as he ran, with
a gesture that was like a wild and hopeless appeal.
Marcia pushed into the room where she had left Bartley.
She had no escape from her fate; she must meet it,
whatever it was. The room was empty, and she
began doggedly to search the house for him, up stairs
and down, carrying the child with her. She would
not have been afraid now to call him; but she had
no voice, and she could not ask the servant anything
when she looked into the kitchen. She saw the
traces of the meal he had made in the dining-room,
and when she went a second time to their chamber to
lay the little girl down in her crib, she saw the
drawers pulled open, and the things as he had tossed
them about in packing his bag. She looked at the
clock on the mantel—an extravagance of Bartley’s,
for which she had scolded him—and it was
only half past eight; she had thought it must be midnight.
