To move was to awake
from a dream to a hideous, terrible reality.
She came slowly toward him. The thin wrap about her head slipped back
and he saw the light flash on to the fair disheveled hair. His eyes
were dazzled, but it seemed to him that there were grey threads where
once had been untarnished gold. Yet he could not and would not speak,
and she came on till she stood opposite him, the dead woman lying
there between them. Then for the first time she lowered her eyes and
he awoke with a start of agonizing pain.
"Why have you come?" he said. "Have you come to plead again? Have you
come to torture me again? Was not that once enough? In a few minutes I
shall sweep your people to destruction. Shall I save you?--is that
what you have come to tell me?"
He waited for her answer, his teeth clenched, his brows knitted in the
old terrible struggle. All his energy, all his determination sank
paralyzed before her and before his love, and yet he knew he must go
on--go on with the destruction of himself, of her, of all that was
dearest to him.
She knelt down and touched the dead face with her white hand, closing
the glazed, staring eyes with a curious tenderness and pity. There was
no surprise or horror in her expression as she at last rose and faced
him--rather a mysterious knowledge which held him bound in wordless
expectation.
"I have come to tell you that woman's history, Steven Caruthers," she
said.
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