THE GATES OF LIFE. Брэм СтокерЧитать онлайн книгу.
dinner he talked with the Doctor on various matters; but presently he asked:
‘I suppose, Doctor, it is no sort of rule that the first child regulates the sex of a family?’
‘No, of course not. Otherwise how should we see boys and girls mixed in one family, as is nearly always the case. But, my friend,’ he went on, ‘you must not build hopes so far away. I have to tell you that your wife is far from strong. Even now she is not so well as I could wish, and there yet may be change.. The Squire leaped impetuously to his feet as he spoke quickly:
‘Then why are we waiting here. Can nothing be done. Let us have the best help, the best advice in the world.. The Doctor raised his hand.
‘Nothing can be done as yet. I have only fear.’
‘Then let us be ready in case your fears should be justified. Who are the best men in London to help in such a case?. The Doctor mentioned two names; and within a few minutes a mounted messenger was galloping to Norcester, the nearest telegraph centre. The messenger was to arrange for a special train if necessary. Shortly afterwards the Doctor went again to see his patient. After a long absence he came back, pale and agitated. Norman felt his heart sink when he saw him; a groan broke from him as the Doctor spoke:
‘She is much worse. I am in great fear that she may pass away before the morning!. The Squire’s strong voice was clouded, with a hoarse veil as he asked:
‘May I see her?’
‘Not yet; at present she is sleeping. She may wake strengthened; in which case you may see her. But if not—’
‘If not?’—the voice was not like his own.
‘Then I shall send for you at once!. The Doctor returned to his vigil. The Squire, left alone, sank on his knees, his face in his hands; his great shoulders shook with the intensity of his grief.
An hour or more passed before he heard hurried steps. He sprang to the door:
‘Well?’
‘You had better come now.’
‘Is she better?’
‘Alas! no. I fear her minutes are numbered. School yourself, my dear old friend. God will help you in this bitter hour. All you can do now is to make her last moments happy.’
‘I know. I know!’ he answered in a voice so calm that his companion wondered.
When they came into the room Margaret was dozing. When her eyes opened and she found her husband beside her bed there spread over her face a glad look; which, alas! soon changed to one of pain. She motioned to him to bend down. He knelt and put his head beside her on the pillow; his arms went tenderly round her as though by his iron devotion and strength he would shield her from all harm. Her voice came very low and in broken gasps; she was summoning all her strength that she might speak:
‘My dear, dear husband, I am so sad at leaving you. You have made me so happy, and I love you so. Forgive me, dear, for the pain I know you will suffer when I am gone. And oh, Stephen, I know you will cherish our little one—yours and mine—when I am gone. She will have no mother; you will have to be father and mother too.’
‘I will hold her in my very heart’s core, my darling, as I hold you!. He could hardly speak from emotion. She went on:
‘And oh, my dear, you will not grieve that she is not a son to carry on your name?. And then a sudden light came into her eyes; and there was exultation in her weak voice as she said:
‘She is to be our only one; let her be indeed our son. Call her the name we both love!. For answer he rose and laid his hand very, very tenderly on the babe as he said:
‘This dear one, my sweet wife, who will carry your soul in her breast, will be my son; the only son I shall ever have. All my life long I shall, please Almighty God, so love her—our little Stephen—as you and I love each other!’
She laid her hand on his so that it touched at once her husband and her child. Then she raised the other weak arm, and placed it round his neck, and their lips met. Her soul went out in this last kiss.
CHAPTER II—The Heart of a Child
For some weeks after his wife’s death Squire Norman was overwhelmed with grief. He made a brave effort, however, to go through the routine of his life; and succeeded so far that he preserved an external appearance of bearing his loss with resignation. But within, all was desolation.
Little Stephen had winning ways which sent deep roots into her father’s heart. The little bundle of nerves which the father took into his arms must have realised with all its senses that, in all that it saw and heard and touched, there was nothing but love and help and protection. Gradually the trust was followed by expectation. If by some chance the father was late in coming to the nursery the child would grow impatient and cast persistent, longing glances at the door. When he came all was joy.
Time went quickly by, and Norman was only recalled to its passing by the growth of his child. Seedtime and harvest, the many comings of nature’s growth were such commonplaces to him, and had been for so many years, that they made on him no impressions of comparison. But his baby was one and one only. Any change in it was not only in itself a new experience, but brought into juxtaposition what is with what was. The changes that began to mark the divergence of sex were positive shocks to him, for they were unexpected. In the very dawn of babyhood dress had no special import; to his masculine eyes sex was lost in youth. But, little by little, came the tiny changes which convention has established. And with each change came to Squire Norman the growing realisation that his child was a woman. A tiny woman, it is true, and requiring more care and protection and devotion than a bigger one; but still a woman. The pretty little ways, the eager caresses, the graspings and holdings of the childish hands, the little roguish smiles and pantings and flirtings were all but repetitions in little of the dalliance of long ago. The father, after all, reads in the same book in which the lover found his knowledge.
At first there was through all his love for his child a certain resentment of her sex. His old hope of a son had been rooted too deeply to give way easily. But when the conviction came, and with it the habit of its acknowledgment, there came also a certain resignation, which is the halting-place for satisfaction. But he never, not then nor afterwards, quite lost the old belief that Stephen was indeed a son. Could there ever have been a doubt, the remembrance of his wife’s eyes and of her faint voice, of her hope and her faith, as she placed her baby in his arms would have refused it a resting-place. This belief tinged all his after-life and moulded his policy with regard to his girl’s upbringing. If she was to be indeed his son as well as his daughter, she must from the first be accustomed to boyish as well as to girlish ways. This, in that she was an only child, was not a difficult matter to accomplish. Had she had brothers and sisters, matters of her sex would soon have found their own level.
There was one person who objected strongly to any deviation from the conventional rule of a girl’s education. This was Miss Laetitia Rowly, who took after a time, in so far as such a place could be taken, that of the child’s mother. Laetitia Rowly was a young aunt of Squire Rowly of Norwood; the younger sister of his father and some sixteen years his own senior. When the old Squire’s second wife had died, Laetitia, then a conceded spinster of thirty-six, had taken possession of the young Margaret. When Margaret had married Squire Norman, Miss Rowly was well satisfied; for she had known Stephen Norman all her life. Though she could have wished a younger bridegroom for her darling, she knew it would be hard to get a better man or one of more suitable station in life. Also she knew that Margaret loved him, and the woman who had never found the happiness of mutual love in her own life found a pleasure in the romance of true love, even when the wooer was middle-aged. She had been travelling in the Far East when the belated news of Margaret’s death came to her. When she had arrived home she announced her intention of taking care of Margaret’s child, just as she had taken care of Margaret. For several reasons this could not be