Three years of M. Najdol's preparations do not fit a man for many careers. His friends, who knew he did not drink, assumed that Conroy had strained his heart through valiant outdoor exercises, and Conroy had with some care invented an imaginary doctor, symptoms, and regimen, which he discussed with them and with his mother in Hereford. She maintained that he would grow out of it, and recommended nux vomica.
When at last Conroy faced a real doctor, it was, he hoped, to be saved from suicide by a strait-waistcoat. Yet Dr. Gilbert had but given him more drugs--a tonic, for instance, that would couple railway carnages--and had advised a night in the train. Not alone the horrors of a railway journey (for which a man who dare keep no servant must e'en pack, label, and address his own bag), but the necessity for holding himself in hand before a stranger 'a little shaken in her nerves.'
He spent a long forenoon packing, because when he assembled and counted things his mind slid off to the hours that remained of the day before his night, and he found himself counting minutes aloud. At such times the injustice of his fate would drive him to revolts which no servant should witness, but on this evening Dr. Gilbert's tonic held him fairly calm while he put up his patent razors.
Waterloo Station shook him into real life. The change for his ticket needed concentration, if only to prevent shillings and pence turning into minutes at the booking-office; and he spoke quickly to a porter about the disposition of his bag. The old 10.8 from Waterloo to the West was an all-night caravan that halted, in the interests of the milk traffic, at almost every station.
Dr. Gilbert stood by the door of the one composite corridor-coach; an older and stouter man behind him. 'So glad you're here!' he cried. 'Let me get your ticket.'
'Certainly not,' Conroy answered. 'I got it myself--long ago. My bag's in too,' he added proudly.
'I beg your pardon. Miss Henschil's here. I'll introduce you.'
'But--but,' he stammered--'think of the state I'm in. If anything happens I shall collapse.'
'Not you. You'd rise to the occasion like a bird. And as for the self-control you were talking of the other day'--Gilbert swung him round--'look!'
A young man in an ulster over a silk-faced frock-coat stood by the carriage window, weeping shamelessly.
'Oh, but that's only drink,' Conroy said. 'I haven't had one of my--my things since lunch.'
'Excellent!' said Gilbert. 'I knew I could depend on you. Come along. Wait for a minute, Chartres.'
A tall woman, veiled, sat by the far window. She bowed her head as the doctor murmured Conroy knew not what. Then he disappeared and the inspector came for tickets.
'My maid--next compartment,' she said slowly.
Conroy showed his ticket, but in returning it to the sleeve-pocket of his ulster the little silver Najdolene case slipped from his glove and fell to the floor. He snatched it up as the moving train flung him into his seat.
'How nice!' said the woman. She leisurely lifted her veil, unbottoned the first button of her left glove, and pressed out from its palm a Najdolene-case.
'Don't!' said Conroy, not realising he had spoken.
'I beg your pardon.' The deep voice was measured, even, and low. Conroy knew what made it so.
'I said "don't"! He wouldn't like you to do it!'
'No, he would not.' She held the tube with its ever-presented tabloid between finger and thumb. 'But aren't you one of the--ah--"soul-weary" too?'
'That's why. Oh, please don't! Not at first. I--I haven't had one since morning. You--you'll set me off!'
'You? Are you so far gone as that?'
He nodded, pressing his palms together. The train jolted through Vauxhall points, and was welcomed with the clang of empty milk-cans for the West.
After long silence she lifted her great eyes, and, with an innocence that would have deceived any sound man, asked Conroy to call her maid to bring her a forgotten book.
Conroy shook his head. 'No. Our sort can't read. Don't!'
'Were you sent to watch me?' The voice never changed.
'Me? I need a keeper myself much more--this night of all!'
'This night? Have you a night, then? They disbelieved me when I told them of mine.' She leaned back and laughed, always slowly. 'Aren't doctors stu-upid? They don't know.'
She leaned her elbow on her knee, lifted her veil that had fallen, and, chin in hand, stared at him. He looked at her--till his eyes were blurred with tears.
'Have I been there, think you?' she said.
'Surely--surely,' Conroy answered, for he had well seen the fear and the horror that lived behind the heavy-lidded eyes, the fine tracing on the broad forehead, and the guard set about the desirable mouth.
'Then--suppose we have one--just one apiece? I've gone without since this afternoon.'
He put up his hand, and would have shouted, but his voice broke.
'Don't! Can't you see that it helps me to help you to keep it off? Don't let's both go down together.'
'But I want one. It's a poor heart that never rejoices. Just one. It's my night.'
'It's mine--too. My sixty-fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh.' He shut his lips firmly against the tide of visualised numbers that threatened to carry him along.
'Ah, it's only my thirty-ninth.' She paused as he had done. 'I wonder if I shall last into the sixties. … Talk to me or I shall go crazy. You're a man. You're the stronger vessel. Tell me when you went to pieces.'
'One, two, three, four, five, six, seven--eight--I beg your pardon.'
'Not in the least. I always pretend I've dropped a stitch of my knitting. I count the days till the last day, then the hours, then the minutes. Do you?'
'I don't think I've done very much else for the last--' said Conroy, shivering, for the night was cold, with a chill he recognised.
'Oh, how comforting to find some one who can talk sense! It's not always the same date, is it?'
'What difference would that make?' He unbuttoned his ulster with a jerk. 'You're a sane woman. Can't you see the wicked--wicked--wicked' (dust flew from the padded arm-rest as he struck it) unfairness of it? What have I done?'
She laid her large hand on his shoulder very firmly.
'If you begin to think over that,' she said, 'you'll go to pieces and be ashamed. Tell me yours, and I'll tell you mine. Only be quiet--be quiet, lad, or you'll set me off!' She made shift to soothe him, though her chin trembled.
'Well,' said he at last, picking at the arm-rest between them, 'mine's nothing much, of course.'
'Don't be a fool! That's for doctors--and mothers.'
'It's Hell,' Conroy muttered. 'It begins on a steamer--on a stifling hot night. I come out of my cabin. I pass through the saloon where the stewards have rolled up the carpets, and the boards are bare and hot and soapy.'
'I've travelled too,' she said.
'Ah! I come on deck. I walk down a covered alleyway. Butcher's meat, bananas, oil, that sort of smell.'
Again she nodded.
'It's a lead-coloured steamer, and the sea's lead-coloured. Perfectly smooth sea--perfectly still ship, except for the engines running, and her waves going off in lines and lines and lines--dull grey. All this time I know something's going to happen.'
'I know. Something going to happen,' she whispered.
'Then I hear a thud in the engine-room. Then the noise of machinery falling down--like fire-irons--and then two most awful yells. They're more like hoots, and I know--I know while I listen--that it means that two men have died as