"I entreat you not to waste time over trivialities! I entreat you to answer me, and quickly."
Mr. Gower"s voice is now apparently coming from his boots.
"Good gracious, Randal, what do you mean?" cries the spinster, turning very yellow. "Prepared to _die!_ Why ask me such a question?"
"Because, dear aunt, your time has come!"
"Randal!" says Miss Gower, trying to rise, "pull me ash.o.r.e. Do you hear me, sir? Pull me ash.o.r.e at once. Cease your levity."
"Sit down," says her nephew sadly. "Pray sit down. It comes easier sitting than any other way, I have been told."
"What comes?" Miss Gower casts a wild glance round her. They are far from the sh.o.r.e, and, indeed, even if they had been nearer to it, no help could reach her, as there is not a soul to be seen, and from where they now are not a glimpse of the house is to be had. "Randal, would you murder me?" cries she.
"Oh, dear aunt, what a question!" says Mr. Gower with deep reproach.
"No, far from that. Learn that I, too, am resolved to die!"
"Oh, heavens!" cries Miss Gower, clinging to the sides of the boat.
"What brought me out to-day? And to think insanity should break out, in our family here, for the first time! Unhappy youth, bethink yourself! Would you have my death upon your soul?"
Here all at once it occurs to her that she has read somewhere of the power of the human eye. _She_ has an eye, and it is human; she will use it! She leans forward and half closes her lids (presumably to concentrate the rays within), and casts upon Gower a glance that she herself would have designated "fell." The effect is, perhaps, a little destroyed by the fact that her big hat has fallen over her left ear, and that she has put on a diabolic grin--meant to be impressive--that gives all the gold with which the dentist has supplied her, to public view. Quite a little fortune in itself! She speaks.
"How _dare_ you!" says she, in a voice meant to be thunder, but which trembles like a jelly. "Take me back at once to the house!
What _madness_ is this!"
She is frightened when she utters the word "madness." But the present madman does not seem to care about it.
"Not madness, aunt," says he, still with unutterable sadness in look and tone, "but sober, terrible _truth!_ Life has ceased to have charms for me. I have therefore resolved to put an end to it!"
"But what of me, Randal!" cries the spinster in an agonized tone.
"I cannot bear to die alone, dear aunt. To leave you to mourn my memory! Such misery I am resolved to spare you. We--_die together!"_
"Randal--Randal, I say, you are out of your mind."
She has forgotten the power of the eye--everything.
"You are right, dear aunt, I _am_ out of my mind," says Mr. Gower, with the utmost gentleness. "I am out of my mind with misery! I have, therefore, bored a hole in the bottom of this boat, through which I"--sweetly--"am glad to see the water is swiftly coming."
He points gently to where he has removed the plug, and where the water is certainly coming into the boat.
"It is rising, I think," says he softly and very pleasantly.
Miss Gower gives a wild scream.
"Help! help!" yells she. She waves her hands and arms towards the sh.o.r.e, but there is no one there to succour her. "Oh, Randal, the water is coming in--it"s wetting my boots. It"s getting on to my petticoats! Oh, my goodness! What shall I do?"
Here she picks up most of her garments; nay, all of them, indeed, and steps on to a loose bit of wood lying in the boat.
"Don"t look! don"t look!" screams she. There is a flicker of something scarlet--a second flicker of something that might be described as white tuckers of white embroidery.
"Look!" says Mr. Gower reproachfully. "What do you take me for? I"d die first. Ah!"--turning modestly aside--"how I have always been maligned!" He sighs. "I"m going to die now," says he. "Go on, aunt,"
in a melancholy tone. "There is little time to lose. Perfect your arrangements. The water is rising. I admire you. I do, indeed. There is a certain dignity in dying nicely, and without a sound."
"I _won"t_ die!" cries Miss Gower wildly. "I _won"t_ be dignified.
Ho! there! Help! help!"
She is appealing to the sh.o.r.es on either side, but no help is forthcoming. She turns at last a pale glance on Randal.
"Randal!" cries she, "you say _you_ are tired of life. But--I--I"m not!"
"This is folly," says Mr. Gower. "It is born of an hour, filled with a sudden fear. In a few moments you will be yourself again, and will know that you are glad of a chance of escaping from this hateful world that you have been for so many years reviling. Just think!
Only yesterday I heard you abusing it, and now in a very few moments you will sink through the quiet waters to a rest this world has never known."
"You are wrong. It is _not_ folly," says Miss Gower wildly. "I don"t want to die. You do, you say. Die, then! But why sacrifice me? Oh, goodness gracious, Randal, the boat is sinking! I _feel_ it. I know it is going down."
"So do I," says Gower, with an unearthly smile. "Pray, aunt, pray!"
"I shan"t!" cries Miss Gower. "Oh, you wretched boy! Oh, Randal, what"s the matter with the boat?"
"It"s settling," says Mr. Gower tragically. "There is time for a last prayer, dear aunt."
Miss Gower gives a wild shriek.
"Forgive me, my beloved aunt," says Mr. Gower, with deep feeling. He is standing up now, and is doing something in the bottom of the boat. "Honour alone has driven me to this deed."
"Honour! Randal! Then it isn"t madness. Oh, my dear boy, what is it?
Oh," shrieking again to the irresponsive sh.o.r.e, "will no one save us?"
"You can!" says Mr. Gower. "At least you _could_. I fear now it is too late. I gave you a hint about that before, but you scorned my quotation. Therefore, thy death be on thy own head!"
"Oh, it can"t be too late yet. You can swim, my dear good Randal. My _dearest_ boy! I can help, you say. But how, Randal, is it--_can_ it be that the debt you spoke of a while ago has driven you to this?"
"Ay, even to this!" says Mr. Gower in a frenzied tone.
"How much is it, dearest? Not _very_ much, eh? Your poor old aunt, you know, is far from rich." As a fact, she hardly knows what to do with her money. "Oh, speak, my dear boy, speak!"
"It is only seven hundred pounds," says Mr. Gower in a voice full of depression. "But rather than ask you to pay it, aunt I would----" He bends downwards.
"Oh, _don"t!"_ screams Miss Gower. "For Heaven"s sake don"t make any more holes!"
"Why not?" says Randal. "We all can die but once!"
"But we can live for a long time yet."
"I _can"t,"_ says he. "Honour calls me. Naught is left me but to die."
Here he stands up and begins to beat frantically upon the bottom of the boat, as if to make a fresh hole.
"Oh, darling boy, don"t! Seven hundred pounds, is it? If that can save us, you shall have it, Randal, you shall indeed!"