Part 54 (2/2)
”It is your wish, Cynthia. You will remember that?” he said gravely.
”For myself I would much rather that it should never be unlocked until both of us are dead.”
Cynthia showed no surprise at the gravity of his voice. But now she too paused. ”There is still time,” she was saying to herself in feverish trouble of mind, though her face was calm. ”There is still time. He is giving me my chance--my last chance.” Her eyelids were lowered over her eyes and she glanced at him under the thick lashes.
”You are afraid to open it, Harry?”
”Yes, I am afraid.”
It was not merely the outrush of old and overwhelming memories which he dreaded. But that locked drawer had become to him a symbol of his own self-mastery. So long as it remained locked, and no longer, he would dominate his torments and be the captain of his soul. For so long he would keep locked a frail door against his yearnings. Cynthia, in a voice so faltering and low that it was hardly audible, said:
”Still I should like it opened.”
”Very well.”
She stood with her fingers clenched upon her palms whilst Harry inserted the blade of his knife in the c.h.i.n.k of the drawer, ran it along until it touched the lock, and then forced apart the fastenings.
There was a crack as of splintering wood. Harry Rames replaced his knife in his pocket, pulled out the drawer, and carried it over to his writing-table.
”There it is,” he said, moving away from it to the fireplace. Cynthia bent over the drawer and turned on the light of a reading lamp which stood upon the table.
”This is your own chart upon the top, Harry?”
”Yes. It is the last one, you see. Hemming may be bringing back another.”
”Will you show me exactly the point you reached?”
It seemed to Harry as if she was bent on trying him to the last point of endurance.
”It is marked there quite plainly, Cynthia,” he said.
Cynthia leaned over the drawer--for a long time. Harry Rames was quite surprised at the closeness of her scrutiny. It was so long since she had shown any interest in his journey or indeed in anything except his political career. As a matter of fact, Cynthia saw of that map nothing but a blur: for her eyes were dim with tears, and she bent so low over its configurations simply because in that att.i.tude her face was hidden.
She moved.
”What is this?”
She took up a brown package, tied up with string, which lay in a corner of the drawer.
”I don't know,” said Rames with a puzzled face. ”I have forgotten.”
”May I open it?”
”Of course.”
Cynthia cut the string and, one after another, perhaps a score of brown telegraph envelopes slipped out in a cascade and fell upon the table in front of her.
”Telegrams,” she said curiously. ”Unopened, too! Oh, Harry!” this with a mocking laugh of reproach. Then she looked at the address of one of the telegrams. It ran:
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