CHAPTER XXXVIII.
FLIGHT.
In old days there were angels who came and took men by the hand, and led them away from the City of Destruction. We see no white winged angels now; but yet men are led away from threatening destruction: a hand is put into theirs, which leads them gently towards a calm and bright land, so that they look no more backward.
Maud effected a speedy reconciliation with Mrs. Vereker, who hadentrenched herself in her bedroom with a French novel till such time asMaud should have recovered her equanimity. Mrs. Vereker at once forgother grievance, listened with real concern to Maud's alarming tidings,and lent herself with great alacrity to assist in the preparations for ahasty departure. Boldero had gone off and was to get coolies[5] togetheras speedily as possible, so as to be well on the way during the coolhours of the early morning, before the heat of the day would rendertravelling a work of distress.
By three o'clock, accordingly, a little army was collected in front ofMrs. Vereker's door. The urgent demands of the Collector and thesubsequent zeal of his subordinates had done wonders, and some forty menhad been assembled at an hour's notice for the task of carrying downMaud, her servant and her various belongings.
The moon had sunk and the torches glared fitfully with dreadful smelland smoke. The figures looked weird and strange and, to Maud's eye,horribly numerous. The arrangement of each box involved enormousdiscussion as to how the burden of carrying it could best be shared. Atlast all was ready; Maud was established in a palanquin; the carrierskept time to the cadence of a wild refrain; the torch-bearers shuffledalong in front, relays of coolies came behind; close at her side rodethe faithful Boldero, marshalling the little force, and ever on thewatch to shield her from any possible annoyance. Maud appreciated hisfidelity, and felt that she had never liked him half well enough before.Her conscience smote her for all her rude speeches, slighting acts andunkind looks; she determined henceforth to be very kind indeed. Boldero,accordingly, though in a great state of agitation and distress about hisfriend's condition, found the journey not quite without its charm. Hehad telegraphed to the Camp for Sutton's two horses to be sent out, andboth of them were well accustomed to carry Maud when occasion offered. Amessenger was to be sent up to each halting-place, so that Maud had notan hour longer to wait for news than was absolutely necessary. It was arelief, hour by hour, to find the distance growing less and the messagesmore recent; still the tidings were very grievous. Sutton, it was clear,was very ill. He had been thoroughly knocked up beforehand, and agitatedand distressed about something, the doctors thought, and this no doubthad helped the evil. This was a cruel stab for Maud. For a few days,said the letter, it would be rash to say what turn the case might take;still there was reason to be hopeful: he was a very strong man, and verytemperate, and these points, of course, were greatly in his favour. Themortality, however, had been terrible at the Camp, and the men weregreatly disheartened. They were now marching every day, in hopes ofkeeping clear of their own infection.
An hour or two later the two travellers came to a halt. Maud found someearly tea awaiting her, and joyfully exchanged the tiring captivity ofthe palanquin for the horse which had been hurried on for her use forthis stage of the journey.
'I have been fast asleep,' she said, as Boldero and she rode down thehillside together and watched the faint glow in the east warminggradually into day, 'and this is very refreshing. The darkness, thecrowd, the blazing torches, the confusion, the babel of tongues we hadlast night seem like a horrid dream. I was never more thankful for thelight. I feel as if I were escaping; and, Mr. Boldero, you are mydeliverer. I shall be grateful to you all my life. You must have had somuch trouble and have done it all so kindly and like yourself.'
'Do not talk of that,' said the other; 'what are friends for but toserve us when we need them?'
'And to forgive us when we wrong them?' said Maud, whose conscience wasgoading her to confession; 'I know I have behaved ill to you--to you andto everybody. Now I am going to try to do better, if only I can get thechance--if only God in His goodness will grant me that.'
'I am hopeful,' said Boldero, 'for both of you. Sutton, I feel, hassomething greater yet to do. We have often laughed and said that nothingcan kill him. You know in cholera it is as much mind as body: courage,calmness, and determination are half the battle.'
'Then,' said Maud, with enthusiasm, faith, and hopefulness glowing inher face, 'I am sure he will do well. His body is his soul's servant,you cannot fancy how completely; it does its bidding as a matter ofcourse. I do not think it would even die without his leave. Have youtelegraphed to say that I am coming?'
'Yes, but leaving it to the doctors to tell him when they think best;or not at all, if they fear the intelligence will excite him. Verylikely they will be afraid to do so.'
'They will do wrong,' said Maud, who knew her husband's temperamentbetter even than Boldero; it will not agitate him, and it will make himresolve to live. He _will_ live, I believe, if it is only in order toforgive me.'
'Do not say "to forgive,"' said the other, who, in a generouslyenthusiastic mood, began to think that Maud was pressing with undueseverity against herself; 'to tell you all that you have been to him andall the sunshine you have brought into his life.'
'All I have been!' cried Maud, with a vehement remorse; 'I could tellhim that best. You could tell him. I mean to tell him the first moment Ican--and I am in an agony till I can do so. I have been mad, Mr.Boldero, or in a dream, I think, and you tried in vain to wake me. Now Iam awake, and know the truth. All the things and people we have leftbehind are merely shadows, and I mistook them for realities; only onething in the world is real for me: my love for my husband. Other peopleflatter and excite and amuse one, and one is carried away with all sortsof follies; but my heart never moves and never can. It is his and hisonly, and I never knew it fully till last night. My life, I find, iscentred in his.'
'I pray God,' said Boldero devoutly, 'we may find him better; andsomehow I believe we shall.'
A level stretch of valley lay before them, and allowed them to pushsharply over the next five or six miles. By ten o'clock they arrived attheir halting-place, where Boldero proposed that they should wait tillthe afternoon. Maud, however, was too restless to halt.
'Suppose,' she said, 'we push on another stage? The sun is not so verydreadful, after all.'
'The next two stages are bad ones,' said Boldero. 'Don't you rememberthat long, troublesome valley with the rocks on either side?--by twelveo'clock they will be all red-hot.'
'Well,' said Maud, 'we will tie a wet towel over my head. Will it do youany harm? or the horses?'
'Me!' cried Boldero, in a tone which at once reassured his companionthat no danger need be apprehended so far as he was concerned; 'as formy horses, they can, of course, go as many stages as you like.'
So they dressed and breakfasted and Maud declared herself quite readyfor an immediate start. Boldero brought in a great plantain-leaf fromthe garden of the little inn, and they tied this under her wide pithhat; then Maud armed herself with an enormous umbrella, and 'Now,' shesaid, 'I am prepared for anything.'
By the end of the stage, however, her strength was spent: she sank intothe first chair that offered itself, and acquiesced thankfully, like atired child, in Boldero's decision that they should not move again tillthe day's fierce glare was past. There was no need to hurry, for she wasnow within a night's march of her husband, and by the morrow's morningwould have known and seen the worst.