House of Mirth (Barnes & Noble Classics - Edith Wharton [166]
Lily’s colour rose at the unexpected advance: it was a long time since real kindness had looked at her from any eyes but Gerty’s.
“Oh, thank you: I’m not particularly well, but Miss Haines was right. I am clumsy.”
“Well, it’s mean work for anybody with a headache.” Miss Kilroy paused irresolutely. “You ought to go right home and lay down. Ever try orangeine?” dh
“Thank you.” Lily held out her hand. “It’s very kind of you—I mean to go home.”
She looked gratefully at Miss Kilroy, but neither knew what more to say. Lily was aware that the other was on the point of offering to go home with her, but she wanted to be alone and silent—even kindness, the sort of kindness that Miss Kilroy could give, would have jarred on her just then.
“Thank you,” she repeated as she turned away.
She struck westward through the dreary March twilight, toward the street where her boarding-house stood. She had resolutely refused Gerty’s offer of hospitality. Something of her mother’s fierce shrinking from observation and sympathy was beginning to develop in her, and the promiscuity of small quarters and close intimacy seemed, on the whole, less endurable than the solitude of a hall bedroomdi in a house where she could come and go unremarked among other workers. For a while she had been sustained by this desire for privacy and independence; but now, perhaps from increasing physical weariness, the lassitude brought about by hours of unwonted confinement she was beginning to feel acutely the ugliness and discomfort. of her surroundings. The day’s task done, she dreaded to return to her narrow room, with its blotched wall-paper and shabby paint; and she hated every step of the walk thither, through the degradation of a New York street in the last stages of decline from fashion to commerce.
But what she dreaded most of all was having to pass the chemist’s at the corner of Sixth Avenue. She had meant to take another street: she had usually done so of late. But today her steps were irresistibly drawn toward the flaring plate-glass corner; she tried to take the lower crossing, but a laden dray crowded her back, and she struck across the street obliquely, reaching the sidewalk just opposite the chemist’s door.
Over the counter she caught the eye of the clerk who had waited on her before, and slipped the prescription into his hand. There could be no question about the prescription: it was a copy of one of Mrs. Hatch’s, obligingly furnished by that lady’s chemist. Lily was confident that the clerk would fill it without hesitation; yet the nervous dread of a refusal, or even of an expression of doubt, communicated itself to her restless hands as she affected to examine the bottles of perfume stacked on the glass case before her.
The clerk had read the prescription without comment; but in the act of handing out the bottle he paused.
“You don’t want to increase the dose, you know,” he remarked.
Lily’s heart contracted. What did he mean by looking at her in that way?
“Of course not,” she murmured, holding out her hand.
“That’s all right: it’s a queer-acting drug. A drop or two more, and off you go—the doctors don’t know why.”
The dread lest he should question her, or keep the bottle back, choked the murmur of acquiescence in her throat; and when at length she emerged safely from the shop she was almost dizzy with the intensity of her relief. The mere touch of the packet thrilled her tired nerves with the delicious promise of a night of sleep, and in the reaction from her momentary fear she felt as if the first fumes of drowsiness were already stealing over her.
In her confusion she stumbled against a man who was hurrying down the last steps of the elevated station.dj He drew back, and she heard her name uttered with surprise. It was Rosedale, fur-coated, glossy and prosperous—but why did she seem to see him so far off, and as if through a mist of splintered crystals? Before she could account for the phenomenon she found herself shaking hands with him. They had parted with scorn on her side and anger upon his, but all trace of these emotions seemed to vanish as their hands met, and she was only aware of a confused wish that she might continue to hold fast to him.