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Page 60
She gave a low gasp, closed her lips tightly, and watched his quick eyes
take note of the trembling that had beset her.
"It's not hysteria, Grant," she cried hastily and anxiously, with
clicking teeth. "You never saw me with hysteria. I've never had it. I
don't know what it is, but I'll control it. I am merely beside myself.
It's partly anger--with you. And it's apprehension and fear. I don't
want to lose him. I do love him, Grant. He is my king, my lover. And I
have sat here beside him so many dreadful days now. Oh, Grant, please,
please."
"Just nerves," he commented drily. "Stay with it. You can best it. If
you were a man I'd say take a smoke."
She went unsteadily back to the stool, where she watched him and fought
for control. From the rough fireplace came the singing of a cricket.
Outside two wolf-dogs bickered. The injured man's chest rose and fell
perceptibly under the fur robes. She saw a smile, not altogether
pleasant, form on Linday's lips.
"How much do you love him?" he asked.
Her breast filled and rose, and her eyes shone with a light unashamed
and proud. He nodded in token that he was answered.
"Do you mind if I take a little time?" He stopped, casting about for the
way to begin. "I remember reading a story--Herbert Shaw wrote it, I
think. I want to tell you about it. There was a woman, young and
beautiful; a man magnificent, a lover of beauty and a wanderer. I don't
know how much like your Rex Strang he was, but I fancy a sort of
resemblance. Well, this man was a painter, a bohemian, a vagabond. He
kissed--oh, several times and for several weeks--and rode away. She
possessed for him what I thought you possessed for me ... at Lake
Geneva. In ten years she wept the beauty out of her face. Some women
turn yellow, you know, when grief upsets their natural juices.
"Now it happened that the man went blind, and ten years afterward, led
as a child by the hand, he stumbled back to her. There was nothing left.
He could no longer paint. And she was very happy, and glad he could not
see her face. Remember, he worshipped beauty. And he continued to hold
her in his arms and believe in her beauty. The memory of it was vivid in
him. He never ceased to talk about it, and to lament that he could not
behold it.
"One day he told her of five great pictures he wished to paint. If only
his sight could be restored to paint them, he could write _finis_ and be
content. And then, no matter how, there came into her hands an elixir.
Anointed on his eyes, the sight would surely and fully return."
Linday shrugged his shoulders.
"You see her struggle. With sight, he could paint his five pictures.
Also, he would leave her. Beauty was his religion. It was impossible
that he could abide her ruined face. Five days she struggled. Then she
anointed his eyes."
Linday broke off and searched her with his eyes, the high lights focused
sharply in the brilliant black.
"The question is, do you love Rex Strang as much as that?"
"And if I do?" she countered.
"Do you?"
"Yes."
"You can sacrifice? You can give him up?"
Slow and reluctant was her "Yes."
"And you will come with me?"
"Yes." This time her voice was a whisper. "When he is well--yes."
"You understand. It must be Lake Geneva over again. You will be my
wife."
She seemed to shrink and droop, but her head nodded.
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