THE WOMAN WITHOUT A HEART.

Otago Witness, Issue 3510, 21 June 1921, Page 66

THE WOMAN WITHOUT A HEART.

fALi. Ririits Reserved.]

By

Frank Shaw.

Old Doctor Wriotheslev gave vent to an impatient snort that half lifted him from tile capacious depths of his easy chair. “Don’t talk to me of that woman,” he cried with emphasis. “A cold-blooded, heartless woman, a card-playing, light headed, silly, foolish imitation of a woman.’’ “I only wanted to say, dear, that she has come back to the Cottage,’’ replied hie spouse meeekly “Um ; she’s been away for three months, gallivanting about at large, amusing herself, and leaving that child to himself—a neglected child, Symons, and an indifferent mother, eh? The sort of thing that fUJa our gaols and aslyums. You know what I mean—neglect leads children into mischief, mischief leads ’em into crime, and there you are. That’s what Mrs Car-at-on ie—a maker of criminals.’’ “You mean the mother of that bov I saw a week or so ago? I caught a glimpse of her this evening; she was driving a runabout ear rather swiftly. Reggie was be-ido her—a very beautiful woman?” “Yes, that’s Mrs Carston.” Mrs Wriotheslev leaned forward interestedly, and regarded her husband's young partner through her glasses. “Do tell me what you thought about her,” she asked. “I thought her the most beautiful woman I ever saw in mv life, Mrs Wriothesley. And yet—one cannot form a, close impression in such a short time, but it seemed to me there was something strangely wanting in her life.” “It’s her heart—sho hasn’t got one ; a woman without a soul. That woman’s life is cut, long round of heartless selfenjovment. Selfish to the core.” “That’s a pity : she seems too lovely to be a mere trifler.” Symons felt a pang of dWpipointmenfc. He- had been greatly impressed by tlio passing view he had had of the lady under discussion : in fact, he Wiu dtoiroiuj of ,-iceiag her again, for

though not a man to fall in love with every pretty face he saw, ho was at an age when a man thinks more than once of matrimony. “Beauty’s only skin-deep, my boy. Give nie a woman who’s womanly; the human side is the only -one worth -cultivating.” Symons contrived to change the subject deftly, but whilst talking minor details of minor events, one portion of his brain wits busy. ‘ ‘She must be unwomanly, as Wriothesiey says, ” was the younger doctor’s mental comment. And he set himself to forget chose faint, fleeting dreams which had obesse-d him more than once. It was only two days later that he met Mrs Carston at close quarters. A cold, formal note arrived at the quaint old house, asking that a professional visit might be paid to The Cottage, as Reggie was indisposed. It was signed “Clarice Carston.’’ Dr Wricthesley tossed it across the breakfast table tp his partner. “You might call there, Symons.” > Simons _ was conscious of something that was almost trepidation so he canterea vip the stretch of turf that bordered the approach to The Cottage. Half way towards the house lie was passed by that same smooth-running motor which he had seen before, and at- the steering wheel was Mrs Carston. She bowed coldly, Symons whipped off his hat, quietened hie "fretful horse with deft skill, and rode on, thinking. ''Wriotheslev wa-s right; she’s altogether heartless,” he communed with himself. “Any woman would stay behind to see what was wrong with her child ; that is, if she was a real woman.” He rode on, and, arriving at the beautiful house, sought his patient. Reggie was 'suffering from a pronounced form of influenza, which had brought him down considerably. Syanons took him on his knee and marvelled at the resemblance between child and mother; Reggie was a facsimile in miniature of his parent, and ye!—there were differences, especially in expression. The doctor looked about—lie was something of a. student of physiognomy, to see if he could discern any evidence of a picture of Reggie’s father, but euch a picture was not in evidence. He knew that Captain Carston had been dead for a couple of years at least, and it seemed- to him that in some respect the boy might take after his father. “Will you let me be your boy?” asked Reggie pathetically, wreathing weak arms about the doctor’s neck. “isn’t no one loves me —no ode.” Symons tightened his hold, as the nurse commenced a shrill outcry against the child’s ingratitude. “Have you taken this boy into any of the houses in the village?” he demanded with severity. The nurse grew somewhat confused, and by dint of close cross-ex-amination Symons elicited from her that she had actually spent the previous afternoon, as she had spent many afternoons, m a house where influenza was rife. “You ought to be ashamed of yourself,” he said, and as he spoke Mrs Carston entered. He rose, setting the lad ba-ci-c in his bed, and bowed formally. The nurse hastened away. “I understand that this child has been in infected houses. He shows signs of grave neglect,” was the doctor’s severe comment. Mrs. Carston regarded him somewhat angrily; it \is plain she little relished being spoken to in this manner. “That is his nurse’s fault,” she said. “If the woman lias failed in her duty she shall be dismissed.' “Reggie is not at all well, madame. The nurse requires supervision, and in my opinion it is the mother’s duty to exercise that supervision. A neglected, unloved child cannot be expected to thrive. You throw an unfair burden on our dhou/lders; w'e doctors cannot perform miracles, Mrs Carston.” “You mean to call me up for judgment, then?” she asked with dangerous quietness. He looked at her, and his heart ached at the cold, proud beauty of her face.

“What a- woman she would be if only she could feel!” he said inwardly. But aloud he remarked: “I certainly hold to the old-fashioned idea that a mother’s duty is towards her child. If this boy had. been loved he would be well now"; as it is, he may be dangerously ill by to-morrow, although I shall, of course", do all in my power to prevent it. If you will send a messenger down to the surgery, medicine will be made ready.” Mrs Car-ton, smarting as she was under the reprimand, looked at him with some curiosity. “I have too. many affairs of mv own to attend to a child’s every complaint,” she observed with coldness. “Yes, the cheap amusements by which an idle woman passes the day. 'lf only you women knew what a. responsibility is ours, . and what terrible consequences sometimes follow on continued newlect—good heavens ! madame, can’t you see that this child is starved for want of love?” “Children are a. nuisance, doctor. Perhaps von will apologise for your remark.” “When I make a statement it is mv habit to stick to it. I will ask Dr Wricthesley to call to-morrow.” From the bed came sa, broken cry: “I don’t want him, I want von.” “Perhaps you will call yourself: since my appearance seems to annov von. I can arrange to he absent.” said Mrs Carston. Symons left the house, mounted his horse, .and rode a.wnv. “I Simpose I lost mv temper a bit there: And I believe that I’m beginning to fall must have played the fool. TTeigho! in love with her in spite of if all. °T’]] have to keep hold of myself; firm hold. T want-a wife who’ll" he a real mother to her children, not a pleusvire-lovirm fool who onlv wants to pass the time.” Mrs Carston watched the door as it, closed behind Symons’ broad hack, and then she clenched her fists and drew herself up to her full height, her eyes blazing. “Yon insufferable prig!” she said. How daro you criticise me? Wfiat does it matter to you what I do or say or think?”

She turned to where her son still sobbed piteously.

“Stop that noise! You’re to blame for this, with your everlasting illnesses!” Reggie ceased his meanings, and lay still, as though petrified, staring bleakly at his mother. “But I’m-—yes, I think I’m glad he didn’t apologise,” said the mother reflectively. “Yes, I am-glad; he would have spoilt everything if he had apologised. I suppose I have failed in my duty, but—but ”

She drew nearer the bed and stood there, looking down on her child. The bitter, hideous past came up full-forced to torture her. In Reggie’s face she saw nothing but the likeness to Captain Reginald Carston, the man who had done his utmost to ruin her life. A month after her marriage, when she was only a child, forced into the match by the machinations of a worldly-minded mother, she had found her eyes wide open to the reality of the things about her. For Captain Carston was in reality an untamed brute. He had sneered at "everything she held sacred; ho had violated her every decent instinct.

“He was a devil, a devil 1” she said bitterly. “And this is his son —his! Why should I love his child. Why should that man dare to criticise me if I try to forget those hideous years?” Her world knew nohing of the countless ignominies to which she had been subjected. Outwardly the Carston household was all harmony, because she wa-s a girl who believed in showing a brave, unconcerned face to the world. On the night Reggie was bom, when she had hoped that the sight of tjie roseleaf face nestling in t-he^ hollow of her arm might soften her tyrant a stony soul, Carston had returned from some convivial gathering in an outrageous state, and had hurled harsh instincts at them both. In the mother’s fearful eyes the son was growing up with such a wonderful resemblance to his dead father that even to look at the little lad was to bring back aching memories of insult and wrong. But Carston was dead, and for two years she had known peace from his insults. The crowning insult of all had been in the reading of Carston’s will. He had been a rich man; he had owned a place in Leicestershire, another in Scotland, another on the Solent, to say nothing of a miniature palace in Mayfair; his actual personal fortune was enormous. But he had left everything to his son, with the exception of a paltry income to the mother, and even that was to be taken from her in the event of her marrying again. She had realised the sting o"f it all, and proudly she had resolved to bear no indebtedness to the man who had ruined her life I will acept sufficient to keep his son as he should be kept,” she told the trustees. “Tor myself, I take nothing—my jointure can revert to the estate. If necessary I will work for my living.” In spite of their entreaties she had adhered to her resolution, until the death of a forgotten uncle had placed her in a position of considerable affluence. But the past scores its marks deeply, the healing of open sores is a lengthy process. Even driving a powerful motor at headlong speed could not satisfy her; feverish bridge parties, mad yachting excursions—nothing sufficed. The woman’s heart was empty of love or tenderness. “I—l wonder if he was right?” she said, studying the averted face of her son. “I wonder if I am neglectful, Reggie?” He looked at her in a frightened manner, and to her distorted vision it was as though the father frowned upon ner. Anger flamed in her breast, she gripped him by the arm and shook him passionately. ‘You little beast!” was her cry. “You little beast!” And she spoke a sharp word to the returned nurse, and left the room forthwith. But when she was once more in her car dashing recklessly along the odorous she found a new thought at war with her old misery; another man’s face obtruded between her arid her remembrance of Carston’s. “He might have been rude,” she whispered, “but he was very much a man—oh, yes, very much a man. And Reggie is fond of him already. They say that children don’t make mistakes in their judgment—-I wonder. ” When Symons called next day the mother was absent, and lie had no more opportunities of speaking his mind to her ; though, in her absence, he delivered a homily to the nurse that scared that worldly person out of a year’s growth. TvGggiej however, nicicle hut slow progress, and a day came when Mrs Carston stopped her runabout and held up an imperious hand as Symons rode by He urged his horse towards her. “Why doesn’t Reggie get better?” she demanded, without preamble. Symons studied her marvellous countenance, and the same old ache set up about his heart. Ho corud no longer blind himself to facts ; be. was in love with her, although he despised her more than words could tell. “Do you want to know the real reason?” he asked. “I should not have questioned you if I had not wanted to know,” came the uncompromising reply. “Then, Mrs. Carston, I must tell you tlicit }our son is s v vccl—]itcr<illy starved Not of food —he gets abundance of that: he is starved of love and affection. I have done all I can do; you mav find a man who can do more, but I doubt it. N-ow is the time for you to do your shore. ” Swffip looked n.t him, .rind he expected to see something of a blush of shame underrun her fair skin, but he was disappointed. She merely threw in the clutch and whirred away, her face set and her eves hard. “He is entirely insufferable,” she confided to the steering-wheel. “I shall change my medical man.” But the nearest practitioner lived a considerable distance away, and it is not easy to make such a drastic change. Symons continued to attend at the Cottage, and little* by little, because lie took a

personal interest in the boy for his mother’s sake, Reggie got stronger. “This is my last visit,” said the doctor cheerily. “You’re well now, sonny.” Reggie at once commenced to whimper, but, remembering lessons he had recently had from the big, ugly man with the kindly smile, he made a brave effort to control himself. “You must be very gentle with your mother, boy. Make her love you; she’ll have to do it if you try, now, good-bye.”

Reggie sniffed suspiciously, but maintained a manly bearing until Symons had departed; then he burst into torrential weeping. But later, hearing his mother’s step, remembering the advice given him, he went to her room and stood, a forlorn figure, inside tile door. “Mummy, won’t you try to love me a bit?” he asked dolefully. Mrs Carston had been lately conscious of the emptiness of her life, and memories of Doctor Symons’ ugly, good-natured face would persist in intruding in her mind.

“ Come here, Reggie,” she said. The lad approached with, a faltering step, and his fear brought the resemblance to the human brute who had been her husband into. striking prominence. She looked at him closely; disgust, fear, almost loathing, came to torment her; she thrust him away with a stifled cry. “I have given her up,” said Symons to his’ senior partner. “Mrs Carston, I mean. I’ve come to the conclusion that you were right; she lias no heart.” “I decided on that ages ago. There’s the telephone.” “Hello! This is Dr Symons. Yes, Dr Symons is speaking.” 11 was Mrs Carston, and her voice was a trifle unsteady. “Will you c-ome over at once, please; Reggie has had a terrible accident ; playing with a chaffeutter—bleeding horribly—come quickly, please, quickly !” “I said I wouldn’t go there again,” said Symons to himself. “But—but—” And aloud he told the agitated caller that he would waste no single minute in hastening to her aid. “I”l tell her a few things she won’t be pleased to hear,” he said to the horse as he flashed along the sleeping lanes. “It’s all a result of her infernal neglect: she deserves to suffer tortures tor this. Poor little Reggie!” Mrs Carston met him in the hall, white of face, terrified of manner; very different from the hard , woman he had "hitherto known. “Well, what happened?” he asked her. “I don t know; they found him lying by the back door ; ho must have crawled there before he fainted. He has lost a terrible amount of blood; but no one heard him cry out.” “No, I suppose no one would. Where is he?” She led him to a silent room, and Symons commenced an expert examination. Reggie had suffered tremendously, that was very evident. The chaffeutter had mangled him to an almost unbelievable extent. Symons found a curious and dreadful thought filling his brain. What if the neglected, unloved child had been seeking a way out of-his loneliness. “Send for a- nurse,” he commanded. “I want expert assistance .here.” Mrs Carston turnecWtway and gave the necessary order. But when she returned to the bed.sidjp her face was again hard and unloving. Reggie was still, so she said to herself, her husband’s child; he was t-erribly like the dead man as lie lay there on the bed. She even watched Symons perform his work without flinching; once or twice.she lent a hand, passing him a needle or an instrument; the doctor would have admired her for her composure, had she shown a single trace of womanly feeling. “Will he live?” she asked. “Listen to rue,” he said, regarding bhe woman fixedly. “Your son has lost an unbelievable quantity of blood, you understand? He is drained dry. There’s one way to give him a lighting chance lor life, and there’s only one. Even then he mightn’t live ; but there’s nothing else to be done.” “And what is it?” she asketl him, impressed bv his manner, and thinking that he had never seemed so handsome since she had known him. “Transfusion of blood.” He shot the words at her as if they were rifle bullets. “He has nsne of his own now; he must have some given to him artificially and at once. Mark you, I don’t say it wdl save him; but otherwise he is certain to die.” “You think you should do this?’’ He bowed, and began to lay out a fresh assortment of instruments. She watched the glittering array of knives with fascinated eyes. “I want someone to offer his blood to save the child,” he said calmly, watching her. “His or her blood. I would give my own, but T need mv strength and faculties to operate. And the thing mustbe done quickly—quickly. Are there any of the servants—healthy women—who would warn you that who ever does volunteer runs a grave risk herself.” She looked at him with a suddenly paling face. “And what will happen if no one volunteers?” she asked. “He will die, and quickly. Perhaps the nurse, when she comes, may be prepared to give her blood for him—she’ll be well paid, of course. But every minute counts now.” Mrs Carston looked at the doctor, and she looked at Reggie where he lav white and bleached upon the pillows that were not whiter than his face. Something began to tug at her heart, something was clamouring in her brain. The hideous resemblance to Carston was fading swiftly away-—a o-reat truth was being born in her soul. Reggie was her son ; bone of her bone, and flesh of her flesh; she was recognising this fact too late. And if the boy died, as die he must, it would he her "fault, and her fault alone. For herself she wanted to live on, life was holding out new promise to her. This masterful man, with the uncompromising manner, fascinated her : she believed that ilia love would be wonderful could it

be won for herself. She knew she loved Symons as she had never believed it possible to love any living thing, but if—

“Yon say the risk is very great?” . 1 I . cannot bind myself to facts; ’ the risk is very great. So great that I doubt if anyone would undertake it. The boy will die—.”

No,” she raid swiftly, drawing a deep breath. “No. I volunteer—he is my child. Even if I die—.” And Symons recognised the mother-love j ming in her face. Her heart, he said, had been awakened at last, and his own. leaped triumphantly in his breast. It seemed that her beauty had taken on an added lustre, spite of the growing pallor of her. cheeks; her eyes were softer than taeir, wont. She laid lier hand on Reggie’s cold forehead and stroked it gently.

Poor little lad!” she said with a crooning note of tenderness in her voice. And then, without warning, she burst into gushing tears. The mother-love had triumphed, wrapped up in icy indifference though it had been for many years. Yes, Reggie was her son—Carston "had no part m him. The very fibres of her being wore merged in the unconscious child : and a mother must bo prepared to give all for tne cake of the son she had borne, for tha-t was love. M iil it be long?” she asked with a wan smile. •“I’m a great coward when there is pain to be endured.” It will not be long?” but I warn you again that there is grave risk to your life. Even if you Survive you mav possibly be an invalid all your days. But you are wrong in calling yourself a coward; you are the bravest woman I have ever seen. And Ido not know that I can say such a sacrifice is called for.” “B; is my wish—now,” she told him. V i vou te!l me what to do?” Symons’s voice was not quite steady as he gave the necessary directions; he hated himself for the pronouncement lie had made. He Knew he loved her now very strongly, so strongly that the thought of her possib’e death filled him with cold dread. He would wait a little longer—perhaps some other way would show. There was the nurse—. But when she appeared she was old and shrivelled; she owned not a spare drop of blood. And there was no more time to be lost. If you wish to withdraw,” he said gravely, “no one can blame you.” But -Mis Carston s hand was on her son’s head, and her eyes were quite steady as she replied : “I have no wish to withdraw. Doctor Symons. I am to blame, and it is for me to pay whatever price is necessary.” Symons made no further remarks, but deftly began to prepare for the operation. Mrs Carston, pale and very weak, opened her eyes and stared wonderingly about her. She saw Symoil’s face bending over hers, and some strange mystical light flashed into her eyes. “Reggie!” she gasped." “Will he live?” Please God, he will. The operation has been so far successful; the rest is m the hands of God. But if he does live y°u will know that vou have saved him.” “I’m. very glad,” whispered Mrs Carston. He smy son—mine; doubly mine now. _ He—m v husband I think I’m going to faint, Doctor; may I hold your hand?” Symons bent and kissed the fingers in his clasp. “Lou may hold it for ever, if vou will,” he said in a husky voice. Mrs Carston smiled. “If vou hold me tight,” she said, “I don’t think I shall faint, after all.”