He pushed her into Mrs. Tracy's rocking chair, lit the lamp, raked out the stove, shook in coal and kindlings, and rummaged for milk, while she leaned back and watched him with dusky burning eyes. She looked little and frail in the faint light, and the returning heat brought out on her cheekbones those scarlet spots which made the hollows underneath so wan. Why was it that whenever she and Vance attempted to do anything jolly together she got tired? That she seemed fated never to keep step with him? He poured out the milk and brought it to her. "Here—swallow this down quick. The matter with you is, you're hungry," he tried to jolly her; but she shook her head, and the smile on her gaunt little face turned into a grimace of weariness. "I guess I'm just tired—" Always the same wistful refrain! "She's sick," Vance thought with sudden terror. Aloud he said: "Wait till I heat the milk up; then maybe it'll tempt you." He thought with a shiver of the cold bed upstairs, their fireless room, the time it would take to warm the house—and where on earth could he find a brick to heat and put at her feet when he got her undressed? He warmed the milk, pressed it to her lips again—but she pushed it away with feverish hands, and the eyes she lifted were dark with a sort of animal fright. "Vanny—I'm so tired. Darling, carry me upstairs!" She wound her arms about his neck, and her cheek burned on his… . Halfway up she clutched him closer, and he felt her whisper in his ear. "It wasn't a woman who telegraphed you, Vanny?" "Woman? Hell no! The idea!" he lied back, stumbling up the steps, pressing her tight, and shrinking from the touch of her tears… .

He had had the vision of a big poem up there on the mountain—yes, he knew it was big. Line after line had sprung up like great snow eagles challenging the sun, soaring in inaccessible glory: he had only to lie back and wait, and one by one they planed down and shut their wings in his breast. And now, stumbling up the stairs in the darkness with this poor child, getting her undressed, trying to find something warm to wrap her feet in, wondering why her eyes were so fixed, her cheeks so scarlet, wondering how you felt a pulse, how you knew if anybody had fever … all the while, with another sense, he watched the crystal splinters of his poem melt away one after another, as the spring icicles were melting from the roof.

Chapter 3