CHAPTER XI
HILDA WEARS A CROWN
At two o"clock on Thanksgiving morning the light burned low in the General"s room. Hilda, wide awake, was reading. Derry stopped at the door.
She rose at once and went to him.
"Is he all right, Miss Merritt?"
"Yes. He"s sound asleep."
"Then you think he"s better?"
"Much better."
"Good. I hope you can stay on the case. Dr. McKenzie says it is all because of your splendid care of him. I just left McKenzie, by the way. I took him and his daughter to the ball at the Willard. We had a corking time."
Her eyes saw a change in him. This was not the listless Derry with whom she had talked the day before--here were flushed cheeks and shining eyes--gay youth and gladness--.
"A corking time," Derry reiterated. "The President was there, and his wife--and we danced a lot--and--" he caught himself up. "Well, good-night, Miss Merritt."
"Good-night." She went back to the shadowed room.
Bronson, following Derry, came back in a half hour with a dry, "Is there anything I can do for you, Miss Merritt?" and then the house was still.
And now Hilda was alone with the old man in the lacquered bed. There would be no interruptions until morning. It was the moment for which she had waited ever since the hour when the General had sent her into his wife"s room for a miniature of Derry, which was locked in the safe.
The suite which had belonged to Mrs. Drake consisted of three rooms--a sitting room, a bedroom and a sun-parlor which had been Derry"s nursery. Nothing had been changed since her death. Every day a maid cleaned and dusted, and at certain seasons the clothes in the presses were brushed and aired and put back again. In a little safe in the wall were jewels, and the key was on the General"s ring. He had given the key to Hilda when he had sent her for the miniature. His fever had been high, and he had not been quite himself. Even a nurse with a finer sense of honor might have argued, however, that her patient must be obeyed. So she knew now where his treasure was kept--behind a Chinese scroll, which when rolled up revealed the panel which hid the safe.
Hilda had never worn a jewel of value in her life. She possessed, it is true, a few trinkets, a gold ring with her monogram engraved in it, a string of Roman pearls, and a plain wrist watch. But such brilliance as that which met her startled eyes when she had first looked into the safe was beyond anything conceived by her rather limited imagination.
She opened the door between the rooms quietly, and went in, leaving a crack that she might hear any movement on the part of her patient. She crossed the sitting room in the dark. Reaching the bedroom she pulled the chain of the lamp, then set a screen to hide any ray of light which might escape.
The room was furnished with a feeling for delicate color--gold and ivory--j.a.panese prints--pale silks and crepes--a bit of jade--a cabinet inlaid with mother-of-pearl. But Hilda"s eyes were not for these.
Indeed, she knew nothing of their value, nothing, indeed, of the value of the Chinese scroll which so effectually hid the panel in the wall.
Within the safe was a large velvet box, and several smaller ones. It was from the big box that Hilda had taken the miniature, and it contained also the crown which she yearned to wear.
She called it a crown! It was a tiara of diamonds, peaked up to a point in front. There was, also, the wide collar of pearls with the diamond slides which had been worn by the painted lady on the stairs.
In the smaller boxes were more pearls, long strings of them; sapphires like a midnight sky, opals, fire in a mist; rubies, emeralds--. They should have been locked in a vault at the General"s bank, but he had wanted nothing taken away, nothing disturbed. Yet with that touch of fever upon him he had given the key to Hilda.
She took off her cap and turned in the neck of her white linen gown.
The pearl collar was a bit small for her, but she managed to snap the three slides. She set the sparkling circlet on her head.
Then she stood back and surveyed herself in the oval mirror!
Gone was the Hilda Merritt whom she had known, and in her place was a queen with a crown! She smiled at her reflection and nodded. For once she was swayed from her stillness and stolidity. She loaded her long hands with rings, and held them to her cheeks; then, struck by the contrast of her white linen sleeve, she rummaged in one of the big closets, and threw on the bed a drift of exquisite apparel.
The gowns were all too small for her, but there was a cloak of velvet and ermine. The General"s wife had worn it to the White House dinner over the gown in which she had been painted. Hilda drew the cloak about her shoulders, and laughed noiselessly. She could look like this, and she had never known it! But now that she knew--!
There was the soft click of the telephone in the General"s room.
Fearful lest the sound should waken her patient, she tore off the tiara, turned up the neck of her dress to hide the shining collar, dropped the cloak, pulled the chain of the lamp, then sped breathless to the shadowed room.
Dr. McKenzie was at the other end of the wire.
"I am coming over, Hilda."
"You need not,"--her voice was a whisper--"he is sound asleep."
"I want to see you for a moment. It is very important."
She hesitated. "It is very late."
"Has young Drake arrived?"
"Yes. He has gone to bed."
"I"ll be there in ten minutes. You can meet me downstairs."
The General stirred. "Miss Merritt."
She hung up the receiver and went to him at once.
"Has the Doctor come?"
"No. But he has just telephoned. He will be here shortly."
His sick old eyes surveyed her. "I never saw you before without your cap--"
"No."
"You are very pretty."
She smiled down at him. "It is nice of you to say it."
"Don"t wear your cap again, I don"t like uniforms for women."
"But when I am on duty I must wear it. You know enough of discipline to understand that I must."
"Yes. But women don"t need discipline, G.o.d bless "em." His old eyes twinkled. "Has Derry come in?"
"Yes, and gone to bed. He asked after you."
"And it"s Thanksgiving morning?"
"Yes."