Part 39 (1/2)

”Nonsense! I'm not in the least frightened. And furthermore I shan't sleep a wink--shan't even try to sleep unless you promise me not to be silly. There's a comfortable room right at the foot of the stairs. If you sleep there, I shall feel more than secure. Will you promise?”

He gave in at discretion: ”Yes; I promise.”

”As soon as you feel the least need of sleep, you'll go to bed?”

”I promise.”

”Very well, then.”

The insistent note faded from her tones. She moved toward the table, put the lamp down, and hesitated in one of her strange, unpresaged moods of diffidence, looking down at the finger-tips with which she traced a meaningless pattern on the oil-cloth.

”You are kind,” she said abruptly, her head bowed, her face hidden from him.

”Kind!” he echoed, dumfounded.

”You are kind and sweet and generous to me,” she insisted in a level voice. ”You have shown me your heart--the heart of a gentleman--without reserve; but of me you have asked nothing.”

”I don't understand--”

”I mean, you haven't once referred to what happened last night. You've been content to let me preserve my confidence, to remain secretive and mysterious in your sight.... That is how I seem to you--isn't it?”

”Secretive and mysterious? But I have no right to your confidence; your affairs are yours, inviolable, unless you choose to discuss them.”

”You would think that way--of course!” Suddenly she showed him her face illumined with its frank, shadowy smile, her sweet eyes, kind and as fearless as the eyes of a child. ”Other men would not, I know. And you have every right to know.”

”I--!”

”You; and I shall tell you.... But not now; there's too much to tell, to explain and make understandable; and I'm too terribly tired. To-morrow, perhaps--or when we escape from this weird place, when I've had time to think things out--”

”At your pleasure,” he a.s.sented gently. ”Only--don't let anything worry you.”

Impulsively she caught both his hands in a clasp at once soft and strong, wholly straightforward and friendly.

”Do you know,” she said in a laughing voice, her head thrown back, soft shadows darkening her mystical eyes, the lamplight caressing her hair until it was as if her head were framed in a halo of pure gold, bright against the sombre background of that mean, bare room--”Do you know, dear man, that you are quite, quite blind?”

”I think,” he said with his twisted smile, ”it would be well for me if I were physically blind at this instant!”

She shook her head in light reproof.

”Blind, quite blind!” she repeated. ”And yet--I'm glad it's so with you.

I wouldn't have you otherwise for worlds.”

She withdrew her hand, took up the lamp, moved a little away from him, and paused, holding his eyes.

”For Love, too, is blind,” she said softly, with a quaint little nod of affirmation. ”Good night.”

He started forward, eyes aflame; took a single pace after her; paused as if against an unseen barrier. His hands dropped by his sides; his chin to his chest; the light died out of his face and left it gray and deeply lined.

In the hallway the lamp's glow receded, hesitated, began to ascend, throwing upon the unpapered walls a distorted silhouette of the rude bal.u.s.trade; then disappeared, leaving the hall cold with empty darkness.