Part 12 (1/2)

”Forever!”

”Who? What? Who's gone?” exclaimed De Gollyer, bewildered by the appearance of a letter. ”Good heavens, dear boy, what has happened?

Who's gone?”

Then Lightbody, by an immense effort, answered:

”Irene--my wife!”

And with a rapid motion he covered his eyes, digging his fingers into his flesh.

De Gollyer, pouncing upon the letter, read:

My dear Jackie: When you read this, I shall have left you forever--

Then he halted with an exclamation, and hastily turned the page for the signature.

”Read!” said Lightbody in a stifled voice.

”I say, this is serious, devilishly serious,” said De Gollyer, now thoroughly amazed. Immediately he began to read, unconsciously emphasizing the emphatic words--a little trick of his enunciation.

When Lightbody had heard from the voice of another the message that stood written before his eyes, all at once all impulses in his brain converged into one. He sprang up, speaking now in quick, distinct syllables, sweeping the room with the fury of his arms.

”I'll find them; by G.o.d, I'll find them. I'll hunt them down. I'll follow them. I'll track them--anywhere--to the ends of the earth--and when I find them--”

De Gollyer, sensitively distressed at such a scene, vainly tried to stop him.

”I'll find them, if I die for it! I'll shoot them down. I'll shoot them down like dogs! I will, by all that's holy, I will! I'll butcher them!

I'll shoot them down, there at my feet, rolling at my feet!”

All at once he felt a weight on his arm, and heard De Gollyer saying, vainly:

”Dear boy, be calm, be calm.”

”Calm!” he cried, with a scream, his anger suddenly focusing on his friend, ”Calm! I won't be calm! What! I come back--slaving all day, slaving for her--come back to take her out to dinner where she wants to go--to the play she wants to see, and I find--nothing--this letter--this bomb--this thunderbolt! Everything gone--my home broken up--my name dishonored--my whole life ruined! And you say be calm--be calm--be calm!”

Then, fearing the hysteria gaining possession of him, he dropped back violently into an armchair and covered his face.

During this outburst, De Gollyer had deliberately removed his gloves, folded them and placed them in his breast pocket. His reputation for social omniscience had been attained by the simple expedient of never being convinced. As soon as the true situation had been unfolded, a slight, skeptical smile hovered about his thin, flouting lips, and, looking at his old friend, he was not unpleasantly aware of something comic in the att.i.tudes of grief. He made one or two false starts, b.u.t.toning his trim cutaway, and then said in a purposely higher key:

”My dear old chap, we must consider--we really must consider what is to be done.”

”There is only one thing to be done,” cried Lightbody in a voice of thunder.

”Permit me!”

”Kill them!”

”One moment!”

De Gollyer, master of himself, never abandoning his critical enjoyment, softened his voice to that controlled note that is the more effective for being opposed to frenzy.