Katey was cheered by his tone, and stood up, anxious to the last degree, but feeling somewhat ashamed of her hasty grief.
The doctor made the examination usual in such cases, and then stood up before he spoke. Katey watched his lips to tell by their motion the coming words before they could be spoken.
“Just as I thought.” Katey’s heart gave a great bound of joy, and her head began to reel, so that she seemed to hear the remainder of his speech as through a curtain. “Now look at the man’s wife — she is going to faint, I warrant, just when she ought to be calm. That’s right. Courage, my poor girl, your husband is only stunned, and will be able to put his arms round your neck in ten minutes.”
Katey’s faintness began to pass away, and she knelt down by Jerry ready to do the doctor’s bidding.
The latter gave some directions, which were carried out, and after a while Jerry opened his eyes. For a time he did not remember anything, and seemed quite dazed, staring blankly at the crowd of faces which he saw around him. Presently he recovered sufficiently to answer the doctor’s questions, which elicited the fact that he was hurt in the head and the side. His wounds were dressed, and Katey, after receiving instructions as to his treatment, took him home, with Parnell’s assistance, in a cab.
Parnell was obliged to return to Dublin that night; and as Jerry was very feverish and restless, Katey was obliged to sit up with him all night. In the morning Jerry was worse, and seemed to be a little off his head. He did not seem to realise where he was, and answered Katey’s anxious inquiries so strangely that she got frightened and sent for Dr. Sharp, in whom she had acquired great confidence from his manner at the time of the accident.
When he saw Jerry Dr. Sharp looked very grave. Katey saw his face fall and began to cry. He turned on her severely and said, although with a spice of tenderness through his sternness —
“Silence, woman. This is no time to cry. This is a time to act — time enough to cry when there is a reason for it.”
“Oh, doctor, is he very bad?” asked poor Katey, so anxiously that the doctor patted her on the head as he answered: —
“It is best for you to face the worse, my dear. The wound on his head is worse than I thought. I think he will have an attack of brain fever. There now, I oughtn’t to tell you anything. Come, come, stir yourself, and then you won’t want to faint. We must get him to hospital whilst he is fit to be moved.”
At the word hospital Katey’s fear became deadly, for she looked upon an institution as in some wise synonymous with ruin; but the doctor was peremptory, and before she had time to mourn Jerry was safely lodged in the nearest hospital.
Katey would have stayed with him all day only that she had her children to look after. Her sorrow at leaving him was much mitigated by the fact that one of the nurses, a Sister of Mercy, with whose sweet gentle face she fell in love, had promised to give him unfailing attention.
When she got home and thought of its desolation, now temporary, but perhaps to be permanent — Katey would have willingly cried herself stupid. But she felt that she must not give way to her feelings; the children were sobbing bitterly, having missed her for so long; and she felt, moreover, that now during Jerry’s illness, which might be a protracted one, there devolved on her the entire support of the family.
When she was going to bed that night she knelt down to say her prayers with a sadder heart than she had ever had before; she prayed for help and strength, and made a silent vow that she would work unceasingly and uncomplainingly, so that all might be as of old for Jerry when he should be well.
Nobly she kept her vow. Early and late she toiled, her only times of relaxation being those which she spent in the hospital watching by her husband’s bedside with her heart wrung by his piteous moans. He did not know her, and thus wrung her heart still more. To a loving wife there is scarcely anything so painful as the knowing that the man she loves — who is a part of herself — does not know her — that the twain which were one, are now but twain again.
She found it easy enough to get work at first, for some of the people living near knowing of her misfortune held out a helping hand. There was not much to gain, for the neighbourhood was a wretched one, but what little was came freely.
It is amongst the very poor that true generosity is found. The rich man pours his gifts, large to magnificence it may be, into the treasury, but he gives them from his superfluity: it is not often that he has to deny himself in order to be even lavish. But the mite of the widow comes out of her distress, and is valued accordingly. It would give many a wholesome lesson to even the truly charitable rich to see and know the good deeds which are done by their poorer brethren. It is only amongst the poor that charity will tolerate equality — nay, where is accorded the dignity which is the birthright of misfortune.
Katey got some little help from Dublin from Mrs. O’Sullivan, who, however, was unable to do much for her on account of the absconding of a solicitor to whom she had intrusted all her little savings.
After a little while the work began to fall away; and do what she would poor Katey found it hard to keep the wolf from the door. She was up before daylight and into the market to buy vegetables which she then sold from house to house; she went charring; she tried needlework. Everything by which an honest penny could be turned she tried, and found no degradation in any employment no matter how lowly.
At last the constant working and watching tended, together with her anxiety, to make her so weak that she could hardly work. Jerry was still dangerously ill. He had by this time regained his consciousness, and she had the pleasure each day of hearing his voice speaking sweet words to her. But he was still wretchedly helpless, and she knew that it would be many a long day before he had regained his old vigour. She did not let him know of her work, but managed to let him believe that the help which she was getting from his mother was sufficient to keep her and the children from want.
When her strength began to go, many articles which could be dispensed with had to go too. Katey’s first visit to a pawn-office was a bitter experience. She was afraid and ashamed to go alone, and got her landlady, from whom she borrowed a thick veil, to go with her. She bore the ordeal well enough, but when she came home she burst out crying, and took her children on her lap and wept over them and clasped them convulsively to her arms.
Her first visit was not her last; and by the time that Jerry was discharged from hospital their lodging, now reduced to a single room, was denuded of all the articles of luxury which had once been Katey’s pride, and even of those articles of utility which were not necessary.
It was with a sinking heart that Katey took home her husband, and it was a moment of agony to her when Jerry looked around him in bewilderment, searching with wondering eyes for all the objects which were familiar to him. Jerry was thunderstruck. For a time he stood silent, and then asked as does one in a dream —
“Why, Katey, what’s all this? Where is everything gone to? I don’t seem to understand.”
Katey was silent, thinking what to say. Jerry asked again with that irritability which often accompanies extreme physical prostration —
“Why don’t you answer me? It isn’t kind to keep me waiting.”
Katey burst into tears. Her feelings and her strength had been too long tried, and now on this day, which she had hoped and prayed for, when her husband had been restored to her, that he should accuse her of unkindness was too much. Jerry got still more impatient, and spoke crossly.
“Katey, what do you mean by crying when I ask you a question? Have I done any wrong to you? Perhaps it would be better if I had died.”
Katey cried still more bitterly, and could only murmur as she laid her head on her husband’s shoulder —
“Oh, Jerry, Jerry. Oh, Jerry, Jerry.”
He put her aside with a motion rather of impatience than of unkindness. Katey did not distinguish the difference; with her head bent down she did not see his face, but