Part 28 (1/2)
”Barbara!”
She was still shaken with sobs
”Barbara, are you listening? You said you'd put your hand in the fire for me Well, did you mean that?”
He snapped the question at her, and she was galvanized to drag herself upright on the sofa
”Yes, I said that”
”You'll do anything I ask?”
”Yes” Fro ”I've told you everything I don't belong tothat--that I don't think you're going to ask me”
”Why not?”
”Because you know I trust you I always have I always shall Oh, God forgive me for the way I've treated you! But it's your fault Whatever I did, I should know that I could always trust you and that in tile sob escaped her, and she steadied herself like a e of a precipice ”You've quitefor me?”
”What is it?”
”Won't _you_ trust _me_? I don't want you to see me home, that's all
It'll remind me of too much Good-bye, Eric I used to think I didn't believe in God, but soot to reward you, and I can't Kiss ain Good-bye, Eric! Oh, oh--my God!”
She stumbled to the door and twisted blindly at the handle It was open before he could help her A grey wedge of fog thrust itself past her as she hurried out of the hall
”You're not going hoht of stairs she turned with arure nailed to a cross
”My darling; it's the last thing I shall ever ask you!”
4
Eric slept little that night Fro-roo himself into a chair for very exhaustion, only to juers of his right hand were yellow fro away; the rest of him became stiff and chilled as the fire died down ”_As if I'd murdered her_” The phrase, self-coined, repeated itself in his brain even when he was not thinking of the shaken, nerveless body which he had tried to revive
His eyes turned again and again to the telephone It would take Barbara ten htened by the thought of her being alone) By then she estThe telephone could not be more silent if she were in very truth dead He sat down at his writing-table and addressed an envelope to her, but he had nothing to put inside it
”_As if I'd ed hied arette-end into her hand, crying out that she was fighting for her life, he had not understood her passionate need of him; yet, when her need wasin her life to which she would subordinate himThe proposal had been checked on his lips
The telephone was poignantly silent She would never ring hiain through shops and exhibitions, never again ring hiht The Thursday dinner, the Friday luncheon, their notes at the week-end, the sweet pride of possession, her glorious companionshi+p in his cloistered life were over For no one else had he ever taken trouble; noas thrown back on an insufficient self To-ain would she give him a tired smile and say, ”Won't you charm the pain away?”
”_As if I'd murdered her_” Eric crossed the hall to his bedroom The front door was still open, and on the lad of an excuse to postpone undressing and spent fiveit in tissue paper for his secretary to carry round It would be savagery not to write a note
”_Dearest, you left this behind I hope you didn't take cold without it It see I can for you