In the Border Country | Page 2

at others, when she simply could not say what she meant, neither pen nor tongue being her natural medium of expression. But if the style that I have used is not hers, it best translates, at least, the mood into which she threw me.
* * * * *
The surgeon, who knew her well, took her hand on the threshold of the operating room.
"Even now, dear friend," he said, "we may turn back. You know what I think of this."
"You promised me!" she cried eagerly. "I have your word that I should not risk this."
"You have my word," said he, "that in your present state of mind and under the present conditions you should not risk it. But I am by no means sure that you could not change both your state of mind and the conditions. If you say you cannot, then, indeed, I will not let you risk it. But if you would only say you could! Then I would risk anything. Will you not say it?"
"I cannot say it," she said. "Open the door!"
"Listen!" said the surgeon; "if when you are on the table, if even when the ether is at your lips, you will raise your finger, I will stop it. Will you remember? For you, too, you know, run a risk in doing this."
"I shall remember," she said, "but I shall not raise my finger." And he opened the door.
Her mind was so busy with a rush of memories and plans, crowded together at will to shut out her fear, that she was unconscious of the little bustle about her, the blunt, crude details of preparation.
"Breathe deeply, please," someone said in her ear, "harder, harder still--so!"
"I am breathing deeply, I am! How can I do this forever? I tell you I am breathing deeply!" she screamed to them, but they paid no attention. The surgeon's face looked sadly at her and receded, small and fine, to an infinite distance. Though she called loudly to them, she realized that in some way the sound did not reach them, that it was useless. She prayed that they might not think her unconscious, for she had never reasoned more clearly. Now her ankles were submerged, now her knees, now her hips, now it was at her chest, now her throat.
"It is all over--you can begin now!" she said deeply, and in order to save herself from a sickening struggle, she bent her soul, as one bends one's body to dive under a combing breaker, and dipped under the wave that threatened her.
Just as one slips through the breathless surf she slipped through, and left them. She heard someone breathing heavily in the room she had left and hurried away from the horrid sound, intending to find her room and change the loose gray gown and the soft fur-lined boots she had put on for her journey to the terrible room. But the hoarse, heavy breathing followed her and threw her into a panic of fear, so that she turned into a side corridor and ran blindly down it, stumbling through a little narrow door at the end of it. The door swung to with a long sigh and she heard the breathing no more.
As she rested in the little room, which was perfectly empty, a door at the other side of it opened suddenly and a woman rushed in. She, too, had on a long gown, and her dark hair hung in two thick braids, one over each shoulder.
"Can you tell me the way out?" she said quickly, "I can't stay here--I can't breathe."
"But you aren't dressed--we must find our rooms first."
"No, no! There are nurses everywhere. We shall be seen! Come this way," and she pointed, shaking, to a long window that opened on a fire escape. The steps were broad and easy; a moment and they were in the street.
"Here is my carriage--I saw it from the window. Let me take you where you want to go," said the woman; "home, directly, James."
The door of the carriage was swinging wide; they had only to step in. As they sank on the seat the fat coachman leaned out and slammed it.
"Drat that door!" he said loudly. "She'll have to go back to the factory again." The footman made some remark and the coachman swore angrily.
"I think I see myself standing here two hours!" he growled. "The gray's nervous as it is. I'm going up through the Park and let them out a little at the other end."
The carriage started. The woman half rose in it and tapped imperiously on the glass.
"James! James!" she cried, but no one answered her. She pressed the knob of the door, but it did not turn.
"I can't make him hear?" she complained, "what shall I do? What do you think is the matter--he