Part 49 (1/2)
”Philip, for pity's sake----”
He runs his fingers through the grey hair, lying moist upon his sun-bronzed brow. The crow's feet of sorrow furrow the corners of his eyes, which are stern, but not angry. They have looked for the last time on the golden season of life, now they stare at Eleanor as if reading in her face the key of the everlasting twilight that has fallen on his days.
Instinctively she cowers back, hiding her burning face in her hands, red with a flush of deepest shame.
”Don't shrink from me,” he says. ”It is almost incomprehensible, Eleanor, but----”
She looks up quickly.
”Ever since you left me I have had no thought but you. In life's morning you were my love, my all. I could not tear you from my heart had I wished to. But I never tried.”
”Is that possible?” she gasps incredulously. ”You must indeed have loved me!”
”I may be mad, but it is so. I love you now in your degradation, and misery, in spite of all!”
The confession staggers her.
”And you show it by hunting me down to destroy my happiness. You must have sought long to find me here, and now that you are successful, now that I am run to earth, what will you do?”
”What do you _think?_”
His face becomes fiendish. She watches his sinister smile.
”I have told you what I believe you capable of--you will murder him. I know it. You have no pity! The love you boast of is swallowed up in hate.”
An evil flame lights his mocking eyes.
”Yes, I might spring at his throat as he comes from the jungle, I might set 'Help' upon him in the dark. He is a weak man, easily unnerved.
The very sight of this knife----”
”Ah!”
Philip has drawn a sharp blade of steel from his coat and flashed it in the moonlight, with a bitter groan.
He replaces it at the sight of her terror, with something of regret in his hard smile.
”What false professions!” sneers Eleanor. ”You dare to speak of loving mo, when you would rob me of the man in whom all my happiness lies!”
Philip winces as if suddenly recalled to facts.
”Yes, your whole future was controlled by him.”
His words fill her with a vague misgiving, but she draws herself up proudly and replies:
”It is safe in Carol's keeping.”
”You are sure of that?”
She bows a cold a.s.sent.