That would have
been bearable. It was sorrow, reproach, a kind of grieving bewilderment,
as though he had changed before her eyes.
"You'd--you'd better go, Robert. We're both of us out of hand. We'll
see each other to-morrow. It will be different then."
He went without a word. But on the dark stairs he stood still, leaning
back against the wall, his wet face between his hands. He said aloud:
"Oh, Francey. Francey, I can't live without you!" He would have gone
back to tell her, but he was physically at the end of everything, and at
the mercy of the power outside himself. He thought:
"There's still to-morrow. I'll tell her everything. I'll help her to
get away. I'll make her understand that it wasn't Howard. To-morrow it
will be all right."
And so went on. And the stolid Georgian door closed with a hard metallic
click, setting its teeth against him.
"Now you see how it happens, Robert Stonehouse!"
5
But he came out of a night of fever and hallucination with very little
left but the will to keep on. Apathy, like a thin protecting skin, had
grown over him, shielding him from further hurt. He did not want to feel
or care any more. The very memory of that "scene" with Francey made him
shrink with a kind of physical disgust. Only no more of that. Back to
work--back to reason. If she wished to go in pursuit of Howard and
Gertie she would have to go. It seemed strange to him now that he should
have minded so desperately.
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