Then the mother rose. Once more her painful senses came back to the woman who was still the ministers mother, and, even in this hideous dream of misery, had not forgotten the habits of her life. When my son comes he will settle it all, said Mrs. Vincent. I expect him any time he may come any minute. Some one has made a mistake. I dont know what that man said; but he has made a mistake, doctor. My son, Mr. Vincent, will see to all that. It has nothing to do with us. Tell me what we are to do for my child. Cut off her hair? Oh, yes, yes, anything! I dont mind it, though it is a sacrifice. She has had a a great fright, doctor. She could not tell me particulars. When her brother comes home, we will hear all said the widow, looking with a jealous gaze in his eyes to see if he believed her. The scene altogether overcame Dr. Rider. He turned away and went to the other side of the room, and took a glass of water from the table before he could answer her or meet that appeal. Then he soothed her as he best could with directions about Susan. He went away immediately to come back in an hour, if perhaps there might be any change so he said; but, in reality, he wanted to escape, to hear this dreadful story, to think what was best. Friendless, with nobody near to protect them, and the officer of justice waiting at the door, what were these women to do? perhaps death waited closer than the visible messenger of fate. Would it be well to stay that more merciful executioner on his way?
The doctor found the officer outside the door, waiting, not without pity, at his post. He heard what was this mans version of the strange tragedy strange, and yet not unfamiliar to human ears. The young woman had been betrayed and ruined. In wild vengeance and misery she had seized one of her seducers pistols and shot him through the head such was the story. And now she had fled
from the scene of the murder, tracked step by step by the avenger. The whole house was in a tumult, as may be supposed. The indignant landlady, who was a member of Salem, could scarcely be prevented going into the jealously-closed room and turning out the unhappy criminal. Another lodger, a nervous woman, had already collected her goods to fly from the place. Outside, some mysterious instinct had collected a few people about the door of the hitherto irreproachable house, which imagination magnified into a crowd. Already Tozer had set out from his shop, red with anger, to inquire into this incipient excitement, which nobody could explain. And still Arthur had not appeared to stand by the miserable women in this horrible climax of fate.
When the doctor went back to the room where Susan was, he found Mrs. Vincent in a state of agitated activity. Mary and she were flitting about the room, moving lights before Susans eyes, making what noises they could with the furniture, keeping a fantastic commotion about the bed. She stirred, doctor, and we were trying to rouse her, said the widow, who had put everything but Susans bodily extremity from her eyes at the moment. The doctor, who was desperate, and whose heart was moved, resorted to desperate measures. He gathered them about the bed, set Mrs. Vincent to support the insensible form, and raising that white marble arm which had developed into such glorious proportion, touched the swollen blue vein with his lancet. The touch acted like magic. In another moment she had struggled up out of her mothers grasp, and thrown out the arm, from which the blood flowed, up above her head: the crimson stream caught her wild eye as she raised her arm in the air. A convulsive shudder shook her frame. She threw herself over on her face with a cry of horror, far more than a match, in her strength of youth and passion, for the agitated arms that held her. Mother, mother, mother! it is his blood! it is his life! cried that despairing voice. The confused bed, the convulsed frame, the flowing blood, all pitifully lighted up by Marys candle, made up of themselves a scene like murder; and Dr. Rider vainly tried to forget the dreadful words which forced upon his mind their untimely testimony. He shuddered at the touch of that white womans hand as he bound up the wounded arm. He withdrew his eyes from the pallid grandeur of the stricken face. In spite of himself, horror mingled with his pity. A heavier stain was upon her than those crimson traces on her pearly skin. Other words followed in an incoherent stream. Fever of the heart and brain, burning up into consuming frenzy, had seized upon this lost creature, who was no longer a girl or innocent. Ere long they had to send for nurses, to restrain her delirium. She, raving with a wild madness which betrayed in every wandering exclamation the horror upon her soul, lay desperate in the room which had enclosed for so many lingering hours her mothers anguish of suspense and fear. In an adjoining room, the man who had followed her to this refuge still waited, watchful yet pitiful, intent that his prisoner should not escape him. While outside a few gazers lingered, looking up at the lights in the windows, with a strange perception that something unusual had happened, though nobody knew what it was. Such was the scene upon which Arthur Vincent, not unwarned, yet incredulous, came suddenly with eyes of horror and wild indignation as he reached his own door.