When Donaldson appeared at the door
of the Arsdale house he was confronted by Ben whose
eyes were afire as though he had been drinking.
Before he could speak a word the latter squared off
before him aggressively.
“What the devil have you done
to my sister?” he demanded.
Donaldson drew back, frightened by the question.
“What do you mean?” he
demanded, the dog dropping from his arms to the floor.
“She ’s in bed, and half
out of her mind,” returned the other fiercely.
“She said you ’d gone! Donaldson,
if you ’ve hurt her ”
The boy’s fists were clenched
as though he were about to strike. Donaldson
stood with his arms hanging limply by his side.
He felt Arsdale’s right to strike if he wished.
“I have n’t gone,” he answered.
“I don’t know what has
happened,” Arsdale ran on heatedly, “but
I want to tell you this that as much as
you ’ve done for me, I won’t stand
for your hurting her.”
“Let me see her,” demanded Donaldson,
coming to himself.
“She won’t see any one!
She ’s locked up in her room. She may
be dead. If she is, you ’ve killed
her!”
Arsdale half choked upon the words.
It was with difficulty that he restrained himself.
He was blind to everything, save that in some way
this man was responsible for the girl’s suffering.
“Perhaps she ’ll see me. Where is
she?”
Donaldson without waiting for an answer
pushed past Arsdale and the latter allowed it, but
followed at his heels. Donaldson knew where she
was without being told. She was in the big front
room where the balcony led outdoors. He went
up the stairs heavily, for he knew that more depended
on the next half hour than had anything so far in all
this harrowing week. Though there was plenty
of light he groped his way close to the wall like
a blind man. At the closed door he paused to
catch his breath. In the meanwhile the boy, half
frantic, pounded on the panels, shouting over his
shoulder,
“She won’t let us in,
I tell you! She won’t let us in!
She may be dead!”
At this, Donaldson forced Arsdale
back. He put his mouth close to the insensate
wood and called her name.
“Elaine.”
There was no answer.
He knocked lightly and called again.
Again the silence, the boy stumbling up against him
with an inarticulate cry. The nurse joined them,
and the three stood there in shivering terror.
Donaldson felt panic clutching at his own heart.
Before throwing his weight against the door, he tried
once more.
“Elaine,” he cried, “it is I Donaldson.”
There was the sound of movement within, and then came
the stricken plea,
“Go away. Please go away.”
Arsdale answered,
“Let me in, Elaine. Nothing shall hurt
you. I’ll ”
Donaldson turned upon him and the nurse.
“Go down-stairs,” he commanded.
His voice made them both shudder back.
“Go down-stairs,” he repeated. “Do
you hear! Leave her to me!”
Arsdale started a protest, but the
nurse, in fright, took his arm and half dragged him
towards the stairs. Donaldson followed threateningly.
His face was terrible. He stood at the head of
the stairs until they reached the hall below.
Then he returned to the door.
“Elaine,” he said, “I
have come back. Do you hear me, Elaine?
I have come back.”
He heard within the sound as of muffled
sobbing. He himself was breathing as though
a great weight were on his chest.
“Elaine,” he cried, “won’t
you open the door to me?”
The sobbing was broken by a tremulous voice.
“Is that you, Peter Donaldson?”
“Yes, yes!”
“Then go away and leave me, Peter Donaldson.”
“Elaine, can you hear me clearly?”
There was the pause of a moment, and than the broken
voice.
“Go away.”
“No,” he answered steadily,
“I can’t. I can’t go away again
until I see you. You must tell me face to face
to go. I ’ve come back to you.”
She did not answer.
“Elaine,” he cried, “open the door
to me. Let me see you.”
“I don’t want to see you.”
He waited a moment. Then he said more soberly,
“Elaine, I can’t go away.
I must stay right here until I see you. I sha’n’t
move from here until my soul goes. Whether you
hear me or not, you will know that I am right here
by the door. At the end of one hour, at the
end of two hours, at the end of a day, I shall still
be here. If they try to drag me away, they ’ll
have to fight they ’ll have to fight
hard.”
There was no answer. He leaned
back against the wall. Below, he heard a whispered
conversation between Arsdale and the nurse; within,
he heard nothing. So five minutes passed, and
to Donaldson the world was chaos. He felt as
though he were locked up in a tomb. There was
the same feeling of dead weight upon the shoulders;
the same sensation of stifling. Then he heard
her voice,
“Are you still there, Peter Donaldson?”
“Yes,” he answered.
“Won’t you please go away?”
“I shall not go away until I have seen you.”
Then another long suspense began, but it was shorter
than the first.
“If I let you come in for a minute, will you
go then?”
“Yes,” he answered, “I will go then.”
It seemed an eternity before he heard
the key turn in the lock and saw the door swing open
a little. He stepped in. She had taken
a position in a far corner. She had drawn the
Japanese shawl tightly about her, and was standing
very erect, her white face like chiseled marble.
He started towards her, but she checked him.
“Do not come any nearer,” she commanded.
He steadied himself.
“I told you,” he began
abruptly, “that I was going because I must.
That was true; I went thinking I was to meet Death.”
She took a step towards him.
“You were ill? You are ill now?”
“No.”
He paused. Now that the time
had come when he could tell her all, it was a harder
thing to do than he had thought. If she withdrew
from him now what would she do after she
had learned? Yet he must do this to be a free
man, to be even a free spirit. There must be
no more shadows between them, not even shadows of
the past.
“I told you,” he said,
“of my life up to the time I came to New York,
of the daily grind it was to get that far. That
was only the beginning after that came
the real struggle. It was easy to fight with
the enemy in front with something for your
fists to strike against. But then came the waiting
years. I was too blind to see all the work that
lay around me. I was too selfish to see what
I might have fought for. I saw nothing except
the wasting months. I lost my grip. I
played the coward.”
He took a quick, sharp breath at the
word. It was like plunging a knife into his
own heart to stand before her and say that.
“One day in the laboratory,”
he struggled on, “Barstow told me of a poison
which would not kill until the end of seven days.
Because I was not the best kind of fighter I stole
it and swallowed it. That was a week ago.
I am here now only because the poison did n’t
work.”
“You you tried to
kill yourself?” she cried in amazement.
“Yes,” he answered unflinchingly,
“I tried to quit. There were many things
I wanted cheap, trivial things, and at the
time I did n’t see my course clear to getting
them in any other way. The other things the
things worth while were around me all the time, but
I could n’t see them.”
He paused. She drew away from him.
“So you see I did not do bravely.
I wanted you to know this from the first, but there
didn’t seem to be any way. I did n’t
want to stand before you as a liar as a
hypocrite, and yet I did n’t want to balk myself
in the little good I found myself able to do.
That silence was part of the penalty. I left
you yesterday without telling, for the same reason.
That and one other: because I did n’t want
you to think me a coward when death might cut off
all opportunity for ever proving otherwise.”
Again he paused, hoping against a
dead hope. But she stood there, cringing away
from him, her frightened lips dumb.
“That is all,” he concluded.
“Now I will go. But don’t you see
that I had to intrude long enough to tell you this?
I stand absolutely honest before you. There
isn’t a lie in me. Now I am going to work.”
He made an odd looking picture as
he stood there. Haggard, hot-eyed, with a touch
of color above his unshaven cheeks, he was like a
victorious general at the end of a hard week’s
campaign.
He turned away from her and went out
of the room. At the foot of the stairs he passed
in silence Arsdale and the nurse. He turned back.
“Sandy! Sandy! Where are you?”
The dog came scrambling over the smooth
floor with a joyous yelp. He picked him up and
passing out the door went down the street. The
few remaining dollars he had left burned in his pocket.
He tossed them into the first sewer. He was
now free free to begin clean handed.
A little farther along he came to
a gang of men at work upon the excavation for a new
house. He needed money for food and a night’s
lodging. He went to the foreman.
“Want an extra hand?”
“Wot th’ devil ye ‘re givin’
us?”
“I ’m in earnest. I have n’t
a cent. I need work. Try me.”
The burly foreman looked him over
with a grin. Then as though he saw a good joke
in it, he gave him a shovel and sent him into the cellar.
Donaldson removed his coat and rolling
up his sleeves took his place beside the others.
Sandy found a comfortable nest in the discarded garment
and settled down contentedly.