Page:The Fruit of the Tree (Wharton 1907).djvu/448

Rh not do it? Suppose she left the stimulants untouched? Wyant was absent, one nurse exhausted with fatigue, the other laid low by headache. Justine had the ﬁeld to herself. For three hours at least no one was likely to cross the threshold of the sick—room.… Ah, if no more time were needed! But there was too much life in Bessy—her youth was ﬁghting too hard for her! She would not sink out of life in three hours … and Justine could not count on more than that.

She looked at the little travelling-clock on the dressing-table, and saw that its hands marked four. An hour had passed already.… She rose and administered the prescribed restorative; then she took the pulse, and listened to the beat of the heart. Strong still—too strong!

As she lifted her head, the vague animal wailing ceased, and she heard her name: “Justine”

She bent down eagerly. “Yes?”

No answer: the wailing had begun again. But the one word showed her that the mind still lived in its torture-house, that the poor powerless body before her was not yet a mere bundle of senseless reﬂexes, but her friend Bessy Amherst, dying, and feeling herself die.…

Justine reseated herself, and the vigil began again. The second hour ebbed slowly—ah, no, it was ﬂying now! Her eyes were on the hands of the clock and they seemed leagued against her to devour the precious [ 432 ]