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Page 21
It was just after lunch, and I was smoking a cigarette
in my study, when I heard the step of my servant Murray
in the passage. I was languidly conscious that a
second step was audible behind, and had hardly troubled
myself to speculate who it might be, when suddenly a
slight noise brought me out of my chair with my skin
creeping with apprehension. I had never particularly
observed before what sort of sound the tapping of a
crutch was, but my quivering nerves told me that I
heard it now in the sharp wooden clack which alternated
with the muffled thud of the foot fall. Another
instant and my servant had shown her in.
I did not attempt the usual conventions of society, nor
did she. I simply stood with the smouldering cigarette
in my hand, and gazed at her. She in her turn looked
silently at me, and at her look I remembered how in
these very pages I had tried to define the expression
of her eyes, whether they were furtive or fierce. To-
day they were fierce--coldly and inexorably so.
"Well," said she at last, "are you still of the same
mind as when I saw you last?"
"I have always been of the same mind."
"Let us understand each other, Professor Gilroy," said
she slowly. "I am not a very safe person to trifle
with, as you should realize by now. It was you who
asked me to enter into a series of experiments with
you, it was you who won my affections, it was you who
professed your love for me, it was you who brought me
your own photograph with words of affection upon it,
and, finally, it was you who on the very same evening
thought fit to insult me most outrageously, addressing
me as no man has ever dared to speak to me yet. Tell
me that those words came from you in a moment of
passion and I am prepared to forget and to forgive
them. You did not mean what you said, Austin? You do
not really hate me?"
I might have pitied this deformed woman--such a longing
for love broke suddenly through the menace of her eyes.
But then I thought of what I had gone through, and my
heart set like flint.
"If ever you heard me speak of love," said I, "you know
very well that it was your voice which spoke, and not
mine. The only words of truth which I have ever been
able to say to you are those which you heard when last
we met."
"I know. Some one has set you against me. It was he!"
She tapped with her crutch upon the floor. "Well, you
know very well that I could bring you this instant
crouching like a spaniel to my feet. You will not find
me again in my hour of weakness, when you can insult me
with impunity. Have a care what you are doing,
Professor Gilroy. You stand in a terrible position.
You have not yet realized the hold which I have upon
you."
I shrugged my shoulders and turned away.
"Well," said she, after a pause, "if you despise my
love, I must see what can be done with fear. You
smile, but the day will come when you will come
screaming to me for pardon. Yes, you will grovel on
the ground before me, proud as you are, and you will
curse the day that ever you turned me from your best
friend into your most bitter enemy. Have a care,
Professor Gilroy!" I saw a white hand shaking in the
air, and a face which was scarcely human, so convulsed
was it with passion. An instant later she was gone,
and I heard the quick hobble and tap receding down the
passage.
But she has left a weight upon my heart. Vague
presentiments of coming misfortune lie heavy upon me.
I try in vain to persuade myself that these are only
words of empty anger. I can remember those relentless
eyes too clearly to think so. What shall I do--ah,
what shall I do? I am no longer master of my own soul.
At any moment this loathsome parasite may creep into
me, and then---- I must tell some one my hideous
secret--I must tell it or go mad. If I had some one to
sympathize and advise! Wilson is out of the question.
Charles Sadler would understand me only so far as his
own experience carries him. Pratt-Haldane! He is a
well-balanced man, a man of great common-sense and
resource. I will go to him. I will tell him every
thing. God grant that he may be able to advise me!
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