In the Border Country | Page 2

her, and never discuss it
afterward unless she should invite the discussion.
I do not, of course, pretend to tell the story as she told it to me. It was
broken by long pauses and many questions on my part. Her phrasing,
though wonderfully effective at times, was empty and inadequate 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