Part 40 (2/2)
”Elice! I won't listen. You're morbid and see ghosts where nothing exists. You're no more to blame for being human and awakening than lightning is to blame when it strikes.” He stood up, suddenly. ”Besides, the past is dead. To attempt to revive it is useless. The future alone matters; and it's that I wish to talk about. I can't bear to think of going away and leaving you as you are now. It's preposterous. If you cared for Steve I shouldn't insist for a moment, or trouble you again so long as I lived; but you don't care for him.” He took a step forward, and stopped where she must look him in the face. ”You don't care for him, that way, do you, Elice?” he asked.
Straight in the eyes the girl answered his look. But the lips spoke nothing.
”And you do love me, love me, don't you, girl?”
Still not a word; only that same steady look.
”Elice,”--the man's hands were on her shoulders, holding her immovable,--”answer me. This is unbearable. Don't you love me? Say it. I must know.”
Bit by bit the long lashes dropped, until the dark eyes were hid. ”I can't say it yet,” she said, ”you know that. Don't compel me to.”
”Cannot or will not?”
Still no answer, merely silence.
Just noticeably the man's big hands tightened their grip. ”I can make you very happy, Elice, girl,” he voiced swiftly; ”I know it; because I have the ability and I love you. I'll take you away, to any place in the world you wish to go, stay as long as you wish, do whatever you choose. I'll give you anything you want, anything you ever wanted. I have the power to do this now, and I'll have more power in future. Nothing can stop me now or prevent, except death alone. Say the word and I'll not go West to-morrow. Instead, we'll begin to live. We're both starved for the good things that life has to offer. We'll eat our fill together, if you but say the word. We've wasted years--both of us, long, precious years.
There's a big, big debt owing us; but at last, at last--”
”Darley Roberts!”
The man suddenly halted, pa.s.sive.
”You don't realize what you're doing, what you're saying. It's unworthy of you.”
A moment longer the grip of the big hands still clung as it was. They dropped, and the man drew back.
”Unworthy?” He looked at her steadily. ”Can you fancy I was trying to--buy you? I thought you realized I love you.”
”I do. But--you're only making it harder for me--to do right.”
”Do right?” Once more the echo. ”Right!” He laughed, as his companion had never before heard him laugh. ”I wonder if it is right to make a certain cripple of one human being on the chance of making a real weakling less weak? Right to--” a sudden tense halt. ”I beg your pardon,” swiftly. ”I didn't mean that. Forget that I said it.” He stooped to pick up his cap and gauntlets. When he came forward once more he was himself again, as he would be from that moment on.
”Don't fancy for a minute I mean to hurt you, or to make it harder for you now,” he said steadily; ”but this is the end, you realize, the turning of the ways--and I must be sure. You still can't give me an answer, Elice?”
The girl did not look at him this time, did not stir.
”No, not even yet.”
A pause, short this time.
”And you won't reconsider about going to work for a living, won't let me help, as a friend, merely as a friend? You know me too well to misunderstand this. It would mean nothing absolutely to me now to help, and would not alter our friends.h.i.+p, if you wish, in the least. Won't you let me do this trifle for you if I ask it?”
Resolutely the girl shook her head, very steadily.
”I understand and appreciate,” she said; ”but I can't.”
A moment longer the man waited. He extended his hand. ”There's nothing more to be said, then, I fancy, except good-bye.”
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