Pelham Wodehouse - The Coming of Bill

Kirk started.

"You jumped!" said Ruth. "You jerked my head. Do you think I didn't know you had noticed it? I knew how unhappy you were when Mr. Jardine was here, and I just hated myself."

"Didn't you like Hank?" asked Kirk.

Ruth was silent for a moment.

"I wish you would," Kirk went on. "You don't know what a real white man old Hank is. You didn't see him properly that night. He was nervous. But he's one of the very best God ever made. We've known each other all our lives. He and I——"

"Don't tell me!" cried Ruth. "Don't you see that that's just the reason why I can't like him? Don't tell me about the things you and he did together, unless you want me to hate him. Don't you understand, dear? It's the same with all your friends. I'm jealous of them for having known you before I did. And I hate these models because they come into a part of your life into which I can't. I want you all to myself. I want to be your whole life. I know it's idiotic and impossible, but I do."

"You are my whole life," said Kirk seriously. "I wasn't born till I met you. There isn't a single moment when you are not my whole life."

She pressed her head contentedly against his arm.

"Kirk."

"Yes?"

"Let me pose for your picture."

"What! You couldn't!"

"Why not?"

"It's terribly hard work. It's an awful strain."

"I'm sure I'm as strong as that Vince girl. You ask Steve; he's seen me throw the medicine-ball."

"But posing is different. Hilda Vince has been trained for it."

"Well let me try, at any rate."

"But——"

"Do! And I'll promise to like your Hank and not put on my grand manner when he begins telling me what fun you and he used to have in the good old days before I was born or thought of. May I?"

"But——"

"Quick! Promise!"

"Very well."

"You dear! I'll be the best model you ever had. I won't move a muscle, and I'll stand there till I drop."

"You'll do nothing of the kind. You'll come right down off that model-throne the instant you feel the least bit tired."

The picture which Kirk was painting was one of those pictures which thousands of young artists are working on unceasingly every day. Kirk's ideas about it were in a delightfully vague state. He had a notion that it might turn out in the end as "Carmen." On the other hand, if anything went wrong and he failed to insert a sufficient amount of wild devilry into it, he could always hedge by calling it "A Reverie" or "The Spanish Maiden."

Possibly, if the thing became too pensive and soulful altogether, he might give it some title suggestive of the absent lover at the bull-fight—"The Toreador's Bride"—or something of that sort. The only point on which he was solid was that it was to strike the Spanish note; and to this end he gave Ruth a costume of black and orange and posed her on the model-throne with a rose in her hair.

Privately he had decided that ten minutes would be Ruth's limit. He knew something of the strain of sitting to an artist.

"Tired?" he asked at the end of this period.

Ruth shook her head and smiled.

"You must be. Come and sit down and take a rest."

"I'm quite all right, dear. Go on with your work."

"Well, shout out the moment you feel you've had enough."

He began to paint again. The minutes went by and Ruth made no movement. He began to grow absorbed in his work. He lost count of time. Ruth ceased to be Ruth, ceased even to be flesh and blood. She was just something he was painting.

"Kirk!"

The sharp suddenness of the cry brought him to his feet, quivering. Ruth was swaying on the model-throne. Her eyes were staring straight before her and her face was twisted with fear.

As he sprang forward she fell, pitching stiffly head foremost, as he had seen men fall in the ring, her arms hanging at her sides; and he caught her.

He carried her to the couch and laid her down. He hung for an instant in doubt whether to go for water or telephone for the doctor. He decided on the telephone.

He hung up the receiver and went back to Ruth. She stirred and gave a little moan. He flew upstairs and returned with a pitcher of water. When he got back Ruth was sitting up. The look of terror was gone from her face. She smiled at him, a faint, curiously happy smile. He flung himself on his knees beside her, his arm round her waist, and burst into a babble of self-reproach.

He cursed himself for being such a brute, such a beast as to let her stand there, tiring herself to death. She must never do it again. He was a devil. He ought to have known she could not stand it. He was not fit to be married. He was not fit to live.

Ruth ruffled his hair.

"Stop abusing my husband," she said. "I'm fond of him. Did you catch me, Kirk?"

"Yes, thank God. I got to you just in time."

"That's the last thing I remember, wondering if you would. You seemed such miles and miles away. It was like looking at something in a mist through the wrong end of a telescope. Oh, Kirk!"

"Yes, honey?"

"It came again, that awful feeling as if something dreadful was going to happen. And then I felt myself going." She paused. "Kirk, I think I know now. I understand; and oh, I'm so happy!"

She buried her face on his shoulder, and they stayed there silent, till there came a ring at the bell. Kirk got up. George Pennicut ushered in the doctor. It was the same little old doctor who had ministered to George in his hour of need.

"Feeling better, Mrs. Winfield?" he said, as he caught sight of Ruth. "Your husband told me over the 'phone that you were unconscious."

"She fainted," cried Kirk. "It was all through me. I——-"

The doctor took him by the shoulders. He had to stretch to do it.

"You go away, young man," he said. "Take a walk round the block. You aren't on in this scene."

Kirk was waiting in the hall when he left a few minutes later.

"Well?" he said anxiously.

"Well?" said the little doctor.

"Is she all right? There's nothing wrong, is there?"

The doctor grinned a friendly grin.

"On the contrary," he said. "You ought to be very pleased."

"What do you mean?"

"It's quite a commonplace occurrence, though I suppose it will seem like a miracle to you. But, believe me, it has happened before. If it hadn't, you and I wouldn't be here now."

Kirk looked at him in utter astonishment. His words seemed meaningless. And then, suddenly, he understood, and his heart seemed to stand still.

"You don't mean——-" he said huskily.

"Yes, I do," said the doctor. "Good-bye, my boy. I've got to hurry off. You caught me just as I was starting for the hospital."

Kirk went back to the studio, his mind in a whirl. Ruth was lying on the couch. She looked up as the door opened. He came quickly to her side.

"Ruth!" he muttered.

Her eyes were shining with a wonderful light of joy. She drew his head down and kissed him.

"Oh, Kirk," she whispered. "I'm happy. I'm happy. I've wanted this so."

He could not speak. He sat on the edge of the couch and looked at her. She had been wonderful to him before. She was a thousand times more wonderful now.

It seemed to Kirk, as the days went by, that a mist of unreality fell like a curtain between him and the things of this world. Commonplace objects lost their character and became things to marvel at. There was a new bond of sympathy between the world and himself.

A citizen walking in the park with his children became a kind of miracle. Here was a man who had travelled the road which he was travelling now, who had had the same hopes and fear and wonder. Once he encountered a prosperous looking individual moving, like a liner among tugs, in the midst of no fewer than six offspring. Kirk fixed him with such a concentrated stare of emotion and excitement that the other was alarmed and went on his way alertly, as one in the presence of danger. It is probable that, if Kirk had happened to ask him the time at that moment, or indeed addressed him at all, he would have screamed for the police.