"Just outside the court it was," she proclaimed, "an' I saw it. If
she'd bin 'erself it couldn't 'ave 'appened. 'No time for 'osspitles,'
ses I. She's not twenty breaths to dror; let 'er die in 'er own bed,
pore thing!" And both she and her baby breaking into wails at one and
the same time, other women, some hysteric, some maudlin with gin, joined
them in a terrified outburst.
"Get out, you women," commanded the doctor, who had forced his way
across the threshold. "Send them away, officer," to the policeman.
There were others to turn out of the room itself, which was crowded with
morbid or terrified creatures, all making for confusion. Glad had
seized the child and was forcing her way out into such air as there was
outside.
The bed--a strange and loathly thing--stood by the empty, rusty
fireplace. Drunken Bet lay on it, a bundle of clothing over which the
doctor bent for but a few minutes before he turned away.
Antony Dart, standing near the door, heard Miss Montaubyn speak to him
in a whisper.
"May I go to 'er?" and the doctor nodded.
She limped lightly forward and her small face was white, but expectant
still. What could she expect now--O Lord, what?
An extraordinary thing happened. An abnormal silence fell. The owners
of such faces as on stretched necks caught sight of her seemed in a
flash to communicate with others in the crowd.
"Jinny Montaubyn!" someone whispered. And "Jinny Montaubyn" was passed
along, leaving an awed stirring in its wake. Those whom the pressure
outside had crushed against the wall near the window in a passionate
hurry, breathed on and rubbed the panes that they might lay their faces
to them. One tore out the rags stuffed in a broken place and listened
breathlessly.
Jinny Montaubyn was kneeling down and laying her small old hand on the
muddied forehead. She held it there a second or so and spoke in a voice
whose low clearness brought back at once to Dart the voice in which she
had spoken to the Something upstairs.
"Bet," she said, "Bet." And then more soft still and yet more clear,
"Bet, my dear."
It seemed incredible, but it was a fact. Slowly the lids of the woman's
eyes lifted and the pupils fixed themselves on Jinny Montaubyn, who
leaned still closer and spoke again.
"'T ain't true," she said. "Not this. 'T ain't TRUE. There IS NO
DEATH," slow and soft, but passionately distinct. "THERE--IS--NO--
DEATH."
The muscles of the woman's face twisted it into a rueful smile. The
three words she dragged out were so faint that perhaps none but Dart's
strained ears heard them.
"Wot--price--ME?"
The soul of her was loosening fast and straining away, but Jinny
Montaubyn followed it.
"THERE--IS--NO--DEATH," and her low voice had the tone of a slender
silver trumpet. "In a minit yer 'll know--in a minit. Lord," lifting
her expectant face, "show her the wye."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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