"Roger, let me stay! Let me nurse you!" she panted. "I didn"t understand. Let me be your friend! Let me help! I implore--I implore you!"
He hesitated a moment, then he lifted her to her feet decidedly, but not unkindly.
"What do you mean?" he said, slowly. "Do you mean that you wish us to be husband and wife again? You are, of course, my wife, in the eye of English law, at this moment."
"Let me try and help you!" she pleaded again, breaking into bitter tears. "I didn"t--I didn"t understand!"
He shook his head.
"You can"t help me. I--I"m afraid I couldn"t bear it. We mustn"t meet.
It--it"s gone too deep."
He thrust his hands into his pockets and walked away to the window. She stood helplessly weeping.
When he returned he was quite composed again.
"Don"t cry so," he said, calmly. "It"s done. We can"t help it. And don"t make yourself too unhappy about me. I"ve had awful times. When I was ill in New York--it was like h.e.l.l. The pain was devilish, and I wasn"t used to being alone, and n.o.body caring a d.a.m.n, and everybody believing me a cad and a bully. But I got over that. It was Beatty"s death that hit me so hard, and that I wasn"t there. It"s that, somehow, I can"t get over--that you did it--that you could have had the heart. It would always come between us. No, we"re better apart. But I"ll tell you something to comfort you. I"ve given up that girl, as I"ve told you, and I"ve given up drink. Herbert won"t believe it, but he"ll find it is so.
And I don"t mean to die before my time. I"m going out to Switzerland directly. I"ll do all the correct things. You see, when a man _knows_ he"s going to die, well," he turned away, "he gets uncommonly curious as to what"s going to come next."
He walked up and down a few turns. Daphne watched him.
"I"m not pious--I never was. But after all, the religious people profess to know something about it, and n.o.body else does. Just supposing it were true?"
He stopped short, looking at her. She understood perfectly that he had Beatty in his mind.
"Well, anyhow, I"m going to live decently for the rest of my time--and die decently. I"m not going to throw away chances. And don"t trouble yourself about money. There"s enough left to carry me through. Good-bye, Daphne!" He held out his hand to her.
She took it, still dumbly weeping. He looked at her with pity.
"Yes, I know, you didn"t understand what you were doing. But you see, Daphne, marriage is----" he sought rather painfully for his words, "it"s a big thing. If it doesn"t make us, it ruins us; I didn"t marry you for the best of reasons, but I was very fond of you--honour bright! I loved you in my way, I should have loved you more and more. I should have been a decent fellow if you"d stuck to me. I had all sorts of plans; you might have taught me anything. I was a fool about Chloe Fairmile, but there was nothing in it, you know there wasn"t. And now it"s all rooted up and done with. Women like to think such things can be mended, but they can"t--they can"t, indeed. It would be foolish to try."
Daphne sank upon a chair and buried her face in her hands. He drew a long and painful breath. "I"m afraid I must go," he said waveringly.
"I--I can"t stand this any longer. Good-bye, Daphne, good-bye."
She only sobbed, as though her life dissolved in grief. He drew near to her, and as she wept, hidden from him, he laid his hand a moment on her shoulder. Then he took up his hat.
"I"m going now," he said in a low voice. "I shan"t come back till you have gone."
She heard him cross the room, his steps in the veranda. Outside, in the summer dark, a figure came to meet him. French drew Roger"s arm into his, and the two walked away. The shadows of the wooded lane received them.
A woman came quickly into the room.
Elsie French looked down upon the sobbing Daphne, her own eyes full of tears, her hands clasped.
"Oh, you poor thing!" she said, under her breath. "You poor thing!" And she knelt down beside her and folded her arms round her.
So from the same heart that had felt a pa.s.sionate pity for the victim, compa.s.sion flowed out on the transgressor. For where others feel the tragedy of suffering, the pure in heart realize with an infinitely sharper pain the tragedy of guilt.
THE END
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
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