The Shadow Portrait (29 page)

“I didn’t come to give you any,” Camrose said easily. He moved over to the bed and asked, “May I sit down?”

“No. I don’t remember sending for any preachers.”

“I don’t always wait to be sent for, although it’s better that way. I won’t stay, Mrs. Warwick. I just wonder if I might say a prayer for you before I go.”

“Say all you want on your way out!”

“Very well,” Camrose said, seeing the obvious displeasure in Avis Warwick’s eyes. “But I will be praying for you.”

“Lots of luck!”

Camrose left the room and turned down the hall. When he reached the waiting room, he shook his head, saying, “You were right. She doesn’t want to talk to any preachers.”

“She’s a pretty hard woman,” Peter said. “I didn’t know how hard until this happened.” He passed a trembling hand across his face. “It was all my fault. I never should have let her ride with me in that car!”

“Always easy to think of the right thing to do after the event,” Phil Winslow said.

“Yes, it is,” Camrose nodded. “The thing to do now is to
be all the help we can to Mrs. Warwick, which seems to be to pray. What about her family?”

“Doesn’t have any,” Peter said.

“None at all?” Phil asked with surprise. “Parents not living?”

“No. She’s a widow, you know. She has one sister somewhere out west, but they’re not close. I asked her if she wanted me to contact her, and she said no, that she wouldn’t come. Pretty sad to be that alone in the world.”

The three men stood there speaking for a time, and finally Phil said, “Come on, Peter, you’re falling apart. I’m taking you home.” He ignored Peter’s protests, and the two men walked Peter Winslow out of the hospital. “You can come back tomorrow after you’ve rested up. It’s going to be a long pull, it looks like,” Phil said. “We’ll be all the help we can. Not much we can do except pray, but we’ll be doing that.”

Peter looked at his relative and a sense of gratitude welled up in him. “Good of you to come, both of you.”

“Why, you think we’d let the devil jump on one of our own?” Phil grinned. “Come on now. Nothing’s too difficult for God. You get some sleep. Tomorrow we’ll talk more.”

As the door opened, Cara Lanier looked up quickly. When she saw Clinton enter she rose, putting down the embroidery piece she had been working on. At the sight of her brother’s face, she demanded, “What’s wrong, Clinton?”

“It’s not good news. Avis Warwick is in pretty bad shape.” Clinton shook his head, and a nervousness caused a slight tic at the corner of his lips. Cara knew him well, and she knew that tic appeared only when he was under tremendous pressure.

“How is she?” She had heard of the accident and her heart had gone out to the woman.

“Pretty bad,” Clinton repeated. “She’s paralyzed from
the waist down, and according to what Phil says, they don’t know whether she’ll ever recover fully.”

“You talked to Phil?”

“Yes, I did. He’s been at the hospital quite a bit. He and Brother Camrose were there.”

“Yes. They’re very good friends. What did Phil say? Anything else?”

“He said Peter’s going to pieces. Blames himself for the accident.”

“That’s foolishness!”

“No, it’s not really,” Clinton shrugged. “He never should have let her get in that car. He knows that now, but it’s too late.” He sat down abruptly on a Morris chair and gripped his hands tightly together. “I don’t know what possessed him to do such a thing.”

“Well, if what Phil’s told me about Avis Warwick is true, she can be pretty persuasive.”

“That’s true enough. Still, a woman doesn’t have any place in a race car.”

Cara went over and stood beside her brother. The two were very close, and she saw that something was troubling him. “What’s wrong, Clinton?”

“I ought to go try to help. I’d like to be of some encouragement to Peter.”

“Why don’t you go?” Cara said. “I wish you would, then come back and tell me how he is—and how Mrs. Warwick is.”

Clinton had needed her words of encouragement. He rose at once and put his hands out and smiled as she came to him and took them. “You’re good for me, Cara. I need a spur sometimes.”

Cara reached up, pulled his head down, and kissed him on the cheek. “Yes, you do, and I’ll be glad to provide it. Now go quickly, and come back and give me a report as soon as you can.”

“All right. I will.”

Leaving the house, Clinton went at once to the
boardinghouse. When he asked the landlady for Peter, she replied, “Why, he’s not here. I think he’s at the hospital.”

For a moment Clinton hesitated. “Is Miss Devorak here?”

“I believe she is. I’ll go see, if you care to wait.”

“Yes. Thank you, Mrs. Mason.”

A few moments later Jolie appeared. She smiled when she saw Clinton. “You just missed Peter. He went to the hospital about thirty minutes ago.”

“I guess I’ll go by there—not that I can do anything, of course.”

Jolie had learned to like Clinton. She knew he was unhappy, and yet powerless to break free of the bondage that his father put him under. Never having had a father to care for her, she had thought,
I’d rather have none than the one he’s got.
She did not voice this, however, but said, “Let me get my coat. I’ll go down with you.”

“That would be great.”

The two left the house, and as they walked toward the hospital, Clinton found himself enjoying Jolie’s company. He thought she was an amazingly pretty girl, and now he asked, “How did you happen to meet Peter?”

“We were in a boxcar riding the rails. We were both bos.”

“Bos? What’s bos?”

“We were hobos!” Jolie turned and laughed up at him. “You didn’t know that?”

“No, and I can’t believe it.”

“You’ll have to, because it’s true. He and Easy got on the boxcar, and I was hiding in the other end. They were nice enough to me, but I was suspicious of men. I’d had a bad experience.”

Clinton turned to look at her and started to ask, but something about the look on her face stopped him. “Sorry for that,” he said.

“It’s all over now, but that night three rough ones got on. They started to . . . to bother me. Peter and Easy tried to stop them, and it turned out to be an awful fight. One of them
had a gun and it fell.” She shook her head and said quietly, “I picked it up and told them to stop. They were about to throw Peter off the train. They didn’t think I’d shoot and started to push him off—so I shot one.”

All this was beyond Clinton Lanier’s experience. “You shot him?” he asked in shock. “Did you kill him?”

“Peter says not. He fell out the door, and Peter and Easy threw the other two out. Peter says he saw the one I shot get up, holding his shoulder. I’ve never been sure whether he told me that to make me feel better or not. I could have killed him.”

They were walking along at a slow pace, and Clinton shook his head. “Nothing like that has ever happened to me.”

“Be thankful for it.”

Her terse words caught at Clinton, and he nodded. “I’ve had it easy, and every wise man I’ve ever known said that men are made by hard things, not easy things. I guess that’s why I’m not the man I ought to be.”

Surprised at Clinton’s words, Jolie turned. “Why, Clinton,” she said, “don’t say that!”

“It’s true enough,” he said bitterly. “My father runs every part of my life!”

“I’m sure he cares for you and wants you to do well.”

“I suppose that’s true. He had a hard time as a boy and a young man himself. I really think he’s so afraid of poverty and hard times that he overreacts.”

The two walked on talking, Clinton telling Jolie about how he had never been able to free himself from his father’s domination. When they got to the hospital, Clinton suddenly stopped and said with shock, “I’ve never told anyone these things! I didn’t mean to drop all this on you, Jolie.”

“It’s all right, Clinton.” Jolie reached out and touched his arm, then smiled. “You’ve got to have faith in God.”

“I think it would take God to make a better man out of me.”

“That’s right. It always takes God to make us better.” Jolie
took his arm confidently and said, “Come on. We’ll talk about this later. Let’s see how Peter’s doing.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

“You’d Strangle Me in a Week!”

Dr. Owen Smith sat behind his desk staring at the young man across from him. He was unhappy with his own performance in the case of Avis Warwick and knew that it was irrational to let his temper escape. It was also useless to blame Peter Winslow, for Smith had become well aware that young Winslow blamed himself far more than anyone else could. Smith had not been particularly interested in the racing of automobiles, which he considered a stupid risk and a senseless waste of time, but he was interested in people. Now he was concerned not only for Avis Warwick’s condition, but also for young Winslow. He knew he needed to be blunt with him, but he wasn’t sure how to begin.

“I can’t offer you very much hope, Mr. Winslow,” Smith finally said. He noticed his own nervous action in drumming the table and with some irritation pulled his hand back and interlaced his fingers. He eyed the tall young man across from him, then said abruptly, “You’re not going to do yourself any good carrying on as you have been.”

Peter was surprised. “What do you mean by that, Dr. Smith?”

“I mean I deal in broken bodies, but there are those doctors who deal with mental problems—and you’re headed for a bad one if you don’t stop blaming yourself for the accident.”

“Who do you want me to blame? It
was
my fault.”

“The way I understand it from Mr. Lanier and from your
relative, Mr. Phil Winslow, it was the fault of that German who drove his car into yours.”

“I should have avoided him.”

“That’s nice to believe,” Smith shrugged, “but if you were thinking clearly, you would understand that you can’t avoid things like this sometimes.”

Peter remained silent, trying to grasp what the doctor was telling him.

“You need to pull yourself together and expend your energies now on helping your friend,” Dr. Smith went on, shaking his head. “I’m very worried about Mrs. Warwick.”

“She’s not getting any better, is she, Doctor?”

“No, and we can’t find the problem.”

“Why don’t you operate?”

With disgust Dr. Smith stared at him and shook his head angrily. “You mean just start cutting away, hoping to find something? That would be pretty stupid, wouldn’t it?” Then he added quickly, “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap at you. It’s just that—well, I don’t like to lose, and I haven’t won this case. But it’s not over yet,” he added.

Instantly Peter’s eyes narrowed. “You think there’s a chance she’ll get better?”

“There’s always a chance. No telling about these things. We doctors never really heal anybody. The body heals itself. Sometimes we can take a few stitches or pull something out that doesn’t need to be there, but basically, when something’s wrong, if it gets fixed at all it’s because the body does the healing.” He looked up at Peter, a curious expression in his eyes. “Or perhaps God does the healing . . . but I wouldn’t know about that.” He rose abruptly. “She’ll be going home today. Will you take her?”

“Yes. I’ve already talked to her about it.”

“Be as positive as you can. At this stage of the game, it’s important that she doesn’t get depressed.”

“She’s already depressed, Doctor, and you know it. And I don’t blame her.”

“I suppose that’s so. I don’t have any more answers,” Smith shrugged. “I wish I did.” He suddenly put his hand out and took Peter’s with a surprisingly strong grip. “Try not to blame yourself, Mr. Winslow. I’ll do whatever I can to help. Come and see me from time to time.”

“Thank you, Doctor.”

Peter left Smith’s office and went down to the room where the nurse was preparing Avis for her departure. A wheelchair stood ready, and a male orderly waited nearby to help. “I can handle this,” Peter said.

The orderly lifted his eyebrows with a questioning arch. “Are you sure?”

“Yes. It’ll be all right.” He turned to Avis, who was sitting in the bed, her legs stretched out in front of her. She was dressed in a nightgown with a blue robe over it. “Ready to go home?” he asked as cheerfully as he could.

“I suppose so.” Avis gave him an odd look, but he ignored it and moved over and picked her up easily. She automatically put her arm around his neck to steady herself, and when he put her in the wheelchair, her legs fell off to one side. He glanced at her and saw the bitterness in her lips but without comment moved her legs back onto the footrest. The nurse came forward and put a blanket over her.

“Now then. You’re all ready to go. I hope you have a speedy recovery, Mrs. Warwick,” she said cheerfully.

Avis looked at the nurse, her expression blank. “Thank you. I’m just sure I will.” There was such bitterness in her tone that Peter flinched, and he said hurriedly, “Thank you, nurse. We appreciate all you’ve done.” Then he pushed the wheelchair out of the room as the nurse moved ahead to open doors. “I’ve got a car outside.”

Peter waited for her to reply, but she said nothing. He pushed the chair to the front door, and as they left the building, the bright sunlight struck Avis’s face. She blinked and raised her hand quickly to shade her eyes. Peter shifted the wheelchair to a more favorable position and opened the front
door. “You can sit up in the front with me.” He reached down and lifted her into the car, then arranged the robe around her legs. Shutting the door, he said, “I’ll go back and get the rest of your things.”