Part 22 (1/2)
With hands close clenched behind him he stood. The love he fancied he had stifled had burst through the restraint he had placed upon it; the injury she had inflicted upon him, the wrong she had done, the cause for resentment she had given him were alike forgotten. The lingering suspicion alone prevented him from taking her in his arms to soothe and comfort her in her distress. Fighting against himself he stood silent, and the woman, aching for someone on whom to lean, s.h.i.+vered.
”What am I to do?” she moaned. ”What am I to do?”
He, thinking only of her, took the words to refer to her present difficulty.
”I think it would be better if you went away,” he said gently. ”I do not think it will be easier for you to bear if you are here when--should anything else come to light.”
”You mean if--if he is arrested?”
”Yes.”
She lifted up her head and turned a tear-stained face towards him.
”Have they found him? Have they? Is that why--why I am asked to leave the house?”
”No, Mrs. Eustace. A new manager will be appointed, and the house is wanted for him.”
”But I will not leave Waroona,” she exclaimed, as she stood up. ”I dare not leave it--till I know. If he--suppose he did do it--and wants to find me?”
”I should advise you to go right away,” Harding said, still speaking gently. ”You will do no good by remaining here where everybody knows what has happened, whereas if you go away you will be able to put all the worry of it away from you.”
”I will not go.”
She spoke with a fierce emphasis, the more p.r.o.nounced because she felt that the course he suggested was the one she ought to follow, and resenting it because, by following it, she would pa.s.s out of his sight, and perchance out of his life for all time.
”I can only advise you,” he said. ”The new manager may be here in a day or two, and the bank will----”
”Oh, I'm not going to stay in this house,” she interrupted. ”I will be out of here to-morrow; but I will not leave Waroona.”
”You will make a mistake if you do not, I think, but it is for you to decide.”
She sat down again, clasping and unclasping her hands in her lap.
”If I go--will you--will you write to me?”
”No, I cannot do that,” he answered at once.
”May I--write to you?”
”I should be sorry if you did.”
She raised her eyes and again looked at him steadily in silence, looked until he turned away.
”How hard you make it, how hard!” she said at length. ”How am I to know what is happening if I go away? I am sure you are expecting his arrest.
Why did those two troopers go off so mysteriously this afternoon? They did not go to the railway. I watched them from upstairs. They rode the other way.”
He did not reply.
”Will you answer me this one question? Do you believe I know he is the thief?”
”If there is anything that I can do to help or a.s.sist you in your present difficulty, Mrs. Eustace, I shall be only too pleased to do it.