She let her hands lie in his.
"But you came here," she said, "meaning to send me away."
"I was a fool," he said, grimly, between his teeth.
She drew her hands away, and then whispered,
"And, Willie--Harry?"
Again he had nothing to answer. She stood looking at him with a wistful longing for a word of comfort. He gave none. She pa.s.sed her hand across her eyes, and burst into sudden sobs.
"How miserable I am!" she sobbed. "I wish I was dead!"
He made as though to take her hand again, but she shrank, and he fell back. With one hand over her eyes, she felt her way back to her chair.
For five minutes or more she sat crying. Ruston did not move. He had nothing wherewith to console her, and he dared not touch her. Then she looked up.
"If I were dead?" she said.
"Hush! hush! You"d break my heart," he answered in low tones.
In the midst of her weeping, for an instant she smiled.
"Ah, Willie, Willie!" she said; and he knew that she read him through and through, so that he was ashamed to protest again.
She did not believe in that from him.
Presently her sobs ceased, and she crushed her handkerchief into a ball in her hand.
"Well, Maggie?" said he in hard even tones.
She rose again to her feet and came to him.
"Kiss me, Willie," she said; "I"m going back home."
He took her in his arms and kissed her. She released herself, and gazed long in his face.
"Why?" he asked. "You can"t bear it; you know you can"t. Come with me, Maggie. I don"t understand you."
"No; I don"t understand myself. I came here meaning to go with you. I came here thinking I could never bear to go back. Ah, you don"t know what it is to live there now. But I must go back. Ah, how I hate it!"
She laid her hand on his arm.
"Think--if I came with you! Think, Willie!"
"Yes," he said, as though it had been wrung from him, "I know. But come all the same, Maggie," and with a sudden gust of pa.s.sion he began to beseech her, declaring that he could not live without her.
"No, no," she cried; "it"s not true, Willie, or you"re not the man I loved. Go on, dear; go on. I shall hear about you. I shall watch you."
"But you"ll be here--with him," he muttered in grim anger.
"Ah, Willie, are you still--still jealous? Even now?"
A silence fell between them.
"You shall come," he said at last. "What do I care for him or the rest of them? I care for nothing but you."
"I will not come, Willie. I dare not come. Willie, in a week--in a day--Willie, my dear, in an hour you will be glad that I would not come."
As she spoke, her voice grew louder. The words sounded like a sentence on him.
"Is that why?" he asked, regarding her with moody eyes.
She hesitated before she answered, in bewildered despair.
"Yes. I don"t know. In part it is. And I daren"t think of Harry. Let me think, Willie, that it"s a little bit because of Harry and the children.
I know I can"t expect you to believe it, but it is a little, though it"s more because of you."
"Of me?--for my sake, do you mean?"
"No; not altogether for your sake; because of you."
"And, Maggie, if he suspects?"
"He won"t suspect," she said. "He would take my word against the world."
"They suspect--some of them--that woman Mrs. Cormack. And--does Marjory?"
"It is nothing. He won"t believe. Marjory will not say a word."
"You"ll persuade him that there was nothing----?"
"Yes; I"ll persuade him," she answered.
She began to pull a glove on to her hand.
"I must go," she said. "It"s nearly an hour since I came."
He took a step towards her.
"You won"t come, Maggie?" he urged, and there was still eagerness in his voice.
"Not again, Willie. I can"t stand it again. Good-bye. I"ve given you everything, Willie. And you"ll think of me now and then?"
He was unmanned. He could not answer her, but turned towards the wall and covered his face with his hand.
"I shan"t think of you like that," she said, a note of wondering reproach in her voice. "I shall think of you conquering. I like the hard look that they blame you for. Well, you"ll have it soon again, Willie."