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Page 113

The clatter of soldiers on their way down to the street came to
her ears; the soft cooing of the pigeons, the whirr of
sewing-machines from the workroom. The incident was closed,
except for the heap of ammunition boxes on the landing, guarded
by an impassive soldier.

Harmony glanced at him. He was eying her steadily, thumbs in,
heels in, toes out, chest out. Harmony put her hand to her heart.

"You!" she said.

The conversation of a sentry, save on a holiday is, "Yea, yea,"
and "Nay, nay."

"Yes, Fraulein."

Harmony put her hands together, a little gesture of appeal,
infinitely touching.

"You will not say that you have found, have seen me?"

"No, Fraulein."

It was in Harmony's mind to ask all her hungry heart craved to
learn--of Peter, of Jimmy, of the Portier, of anything that
belonged to the old life in the Siebensternstrasse. But there was
no time. The sentry's impassive face became rigid; he looked
through her, not at her. Harmony turned.

The man in the green hat was coming up the staircase. There was
no further chance to question. The sentry was set to carrying the
boxes down the staircase.

Full morning now, with the winter sun shining on the beggars in
the market, on the crowds in the parks, on the flower sellers in
the Stephansplatz; shining on Harmony's golden head as she bent
over a bit of chiffon, on the old milkwoman carrying up the
whitewashed staircase her heavy cans of milk; on the carrier
pigeon winging its way to the south; beating in through bars to
the exalted face of Herr Georgiev; resting on Peter's drooping
shoulders, on the neglected mice and the wooden soldier, on the
closed eyes of a sick child--the worshiped sun, peering
forth--the golden window of the East.

CHAPTER XXVI

Jimmy was dying. Peter, fighting hard, was beaten at last. All
through the night he had felt it; during the hours before the
dawn there had been times when the small pulse wavered,
flickered, almost ceased. With the daylight there had been a
trifle of recovery, enough for a bit of hope, enough to make
harder Peter's acceptance of the inevitable.

The boy was very happy, quite content and comfortable. When he
opened his eyes he smiled at Peter, and Peter, gray of face,
smiled back. Peter died many deaths that night.

At daylight Jimmy fell into a sleep that was really stupor.
Marie, creeping to the door in the faint dawn, found the boy
apparently asleep and Peter on his knees beside the bed. He
raised his head at her footstep and the girl was startled at the
suffering in his face. He motioned her back.

"But you must have a little sleep, Peter."

"No. I'll stay until--Go back to bed. It is very early."

Peter had not been able after all to secure the Nurse Elisabet,
and now it was useless. At eight o'clock he let Marie take his
place, then he bathed and dressed and prepared to face another
day, perhaps another night. For the child's release came slowly.
He tried to eat breakfast, but managed only a cup of coffee.

Many things had come to Peter in the long night, and one was
insistent--the boy's mother was in Vienna and he was dying
without her. Peter might know in his heart that he had done the
best thing for the child, but like Harmony his early training was
rising now to accuse him. He had separated mother and child. Who
was he to have decided the mother's unfitness, to have played
destiny? How lightly he had taken the lives of others in his
hand, and to what end? Harmony, God knows where; the boy dying
without his mother. Whatever that mother might be, her place that
day was with her boy. What a wreck he had made of things! He was
humbled as well as stricken, poor Peter!

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Books | Photos | Paul Mutton | Mon 29th Dec 2025, 10:23

The Street of Seven Stars by Mary Roberts Rinehart