The Vertical City | Page 8

Hold my misfortune against me. Let my neuralgia and
Doctor Heyman's prescription to cure it ruin my life. Rob me of what
happiness with a good man there is left in it for me. I don't want
happiness. Don't expect it. I'm here just to suffer. My daughter will see
to that. Oh, I know what is on your mind. You want to make me out
something--terrible--because Doctor Heyman once taught me how to
help myself a little when I'm nearly wild with neuralgia. Those were
doctor's orders. I'll kill myself before I let you make me out something
terrible. I never even knew what it was before the doctor gave his
prescription. I'll kill--you hear?--kill myself."
She was hoarse. She was tear splotched so that her lips were slippery
with them, and while the ague of her passion shook her, Alma, her own
face swept white and her voice guttered with restraint, took her mother
into the cradle of her arms and rocked and hushed her there.
"Mamma, mamma, what are you saying? I'm not blaming you,
sweetheart. I blame him--Doctor Heyman--for prescribing it in the
beginning. I know your fight. How brave it is. Even when I'm crossest
with you, I realize. Alma's fighting with you dearest every inch of the
way until--you're cured! And then--maybe--some day--anything you
want! But not now. Mamma, you wouldn't marry Louis Latz now!"
"I would. He's my cure. A good home with a good man and money
enough to travel and forget myself. Alma, mamma knows she's not an
angel. Sometimes when she thinks what she's put her little girl through
this last year she just wants to go out on the hilltop where she caught
the neuralgia and lie down beside that grave out there and--"
"Mamma, don't talk like that!"
"But now's my chance, Alma, to get well. I've too much worry in this
big hotel trying to keep up big expenses on little money and--"
"I know it, mamma. That's why I'm so in favor of finding ourselves a
sweet, tiny little apartment with kitch--"
"No! Your father died with the world thinking him a rich man and they
will never find out from me that he wasn't. I won't be the one to
humiliate his memory--a man who enjoyed keeping up appearances the
way he did. Oh, Alma, Alma, I'm going to get well now! I promise. So
help me God if I ever give in to--it again."

"Mamma, please! For God's sake, you've said the same thing so often,
only to break your promise."
"I've been weak, Alma; I don't deny it. But nobody who hasn't been
tortured as I have can realize what it means to get relief just by--"
"Mamma, you're not playing fair this minute. That's the frightening part.
It isn't only the neuralgia any more. It's just desire. That's what's so
terrible to me, mamma. The way you have been taking it these last
months. Just from--desire."
Mrs. Samstag buried her face, shuddering, down into her hands.
"O God! My own child against me!"
"No, mamma. Why, sweetheart, nobody knows better than I do how
sweet and good you are when you are away from--it. We'll fight it
together and win! I'm not afraid. It's been worse this last month because
you've been nervous, dear. I understand now. You see, I--didn't dream
of you and--Louis Latz. We'll forget--we'll take a little two-room
apartment of our own, darling, and get your mind on housekeeping, and
I'll take up stenography or social ser--"
"What good am I, anyway? No good. In my own way. In my child's
way. A young man like Leo Friedlander crazy to propose and my child
can't let him come to the point because she is afraid to leave her mother.
Oh, I know--I know more than you think I do. Ruining your life! That's
what I am, and mine, too!"
Tears now ran in hot cascades down Alma's cheeks.
"Why, mamma, as if I cared about anything--just so you--get well."
"I know. I know the way you tremble when he telephones, and color up
when he--"
"Mamma, how can you?"
"I know what I've done. Ruined my baby's life, and now--"
"No!"
"Then help me, Alma. Louis wants me for his happiness. I want him for
mine. Nothing will cure me like having a good man to live up to. The
minute I find myself getting the craving for--it--don't you see, baby,
fear that a good husband like Louis could find out such a thing about
me would hold me back? See, Alma?"
"That's a wrong basis to start married life on--"
"I'm a woman who needs a man to baby her, Alma. That's the cure for
me. Not to let me would be the same as to kill me. I've