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Therewas a terrible pause. For a moment a breathless silence seemed to prevail, both outside the house and inside. Then they heard the wind leap up and come howling back, rattling the windows. Faunce began to talk again with a dry throat:
“He was dying. If I had stayed, I should have died, too. I tell you I couldn’t stand it! A mortal terror had seized me, and I simply couldn’t stand up against it. I had to go!”
The doctor leaned forward in his chair, his eyes fixed on his visitor, but he did not interrupt. He was, in fact, at the moment too much astonished to speak.
“I asked you, a while ago, if you had ever been afraid of death,” Faunce went on. “It wasn’t a fair question. You couldn’t answer it, because you’ve never faced a death like that. I had never been a coward before, but it seized me then—fear, naked, hideous fear! It ground me and tore me. I tell you I couldn’t resist it. I—I had to go!” he repeated again.
“You left him; you got to the cache,” Dr. Gerry managed to say at last; “and then you andthe men returned—you must have returned—to find his body!”
“Yes, I went back—oh, God!” Faunce shrank with a gesture of horror. “Why do you ask me? Of course, we went back as soon as we could. But what did we find? Drifted snow-banks, ice—ice—ice! There was no trace of the body—he lay deep down in that awful waste!”
The doctor had pulled himself still farther forward in his chair, peering at the younger man curiously.
“Do you think you found the place?”
Faunce swept the thing from him with a gesture that expressed almost physical pain.
“I—I’ve sometimes feared we didn’t, that I had forgotten. There couldn’t be any track, you know; but—he was dead!” He paused again, still breathing hard. Then he turned a haggard look on his auditor. “You’re a doctor; you can help me; you can tell me the truth,” he pleaded in an altered voice. “Answer me—does it take long to freeze to death?”
“Not long—in such a case.”
“He wasn’t conscious—I know he wasn’t conscious; he didn’t know when I went!” Faunce protested, as if the fact of Overton’s numbness to his desertion established an excuse. “When that terrible storm broke, there wasn’t a hope of saving him. We barely saved ourselves. I told theothers to come with me to find the body. We found no trace!”
Faunce’s voice broke at last, and he hid his face in his hands. Without comment, the doctor leaned back in his chair again and gazed at him.
There was another pause, and then Gerry rose hastily and left the room, apparently on some urgent errand. When he returned, after an interval of several minutes, he brought a large, flat book with him. He found his visitor as he had expected, still sitting before the fire. Faunce had picked up the poker, and was idly adjusting a fallen log, as if he had at least partially recovered from his emotion; but the vacant expression in his eyes betrayed his total self-absorption. The doctor came to a chair opposite, and, opening the book he had brought, pointed to a rough map or diagram showing the progress of the Overton expedition.
“Now, tell me where you left him.”
Dropping the poker, Faunce leaned over and put his finger on the page.
“About there, as near as I can tell you.”
“Beyond hope of rescue?”
“Absolutely.”
The doctor closed the book.
“You knew he loved Diane Herford?”
“I had supposed so; he never told me.”
“Well, he did; and it’s fair to assume that she cared for him. He was the kind of a man a womanwould care for. But you left him there and came back to ask her to marry you?”
Faunce flushed, and then broke out resentfully:
“I love her!”
The old man leaned back in his chair with a strange grimace, as if a nauseous draft had been offered to him and he had refused to taste it. Faunce, turning at the moment, saw the doctor’s expression, and it kindled his anger again.
“I told you that I love her, that I wouldn’t give her up if Overton came back from the dead!”
“You knew he couldn’t come back,” retorted the doctor. “You saw to that!”
Faunce stared at him in blank dismay.
“My God, do you think I killed him? Do you imagine that?”
“There are some fine shades, then, between abandoning him to die and actually killing him?”
“I’m not a murderer!”
Dr. Gerry laughed bitterly.
“I may be a coward,” Faunce pursued with rising passion, “but I’m no murderer! I swear to you, on my soul, that I never thought of Diane there. I never thought of anything but flight. It was a kind of madness. If it had been my brother, I should have had to do the same thing. I was mad, mad with fear!”
The doctor uttered an inarticulate sound, stooped, and, seizing the tongs, picked up a smoking log that had rolled out to the fender andpitched it back into the fire. The physical action seemed to relieve the tension of his feelings. He settled back in his chair and waited for Faunce to go on with his confession.
Dr. Gerry’s view of the tragedy seemed to have destroyed some remaining stronghold in the younger man’s mind. Faunce kept reiterating his protest in one form or another.
“Listen—I’m not a murderer! If I had killed him, I never should have returned here.”
“Oh, yes, you would! Ninety-nine men out of a hundred return to the scene of their crimes.”
“But I tell you I didn’t hurt a hair of his head! It was a choice between his life and mine, and I left him. It might not even have been a choice, for we should both have perished. If I had stayed, I should have died with him. It would have been heroic—but I didn’t. How many men would?”
“Did he leave Rayburn?”
Faunce reddened.
“No. He had a kind of bull-headed obstinacy—he would stay.”
“Ah! You tried to dissuade him?”
“I told him that we were risking all three lives, instead of one, by staying.”
“But he stayed?”
“He offered to stay alone. I stayed with him.”
“Had you the means to leave him? How about the dog-train?”
“We were short—one of the dogs had died;but the madness hadn’t seized me then. I helped him to the last. We were together when we buried Rayburn.”
“I remember you paid a tribute to his friendship when we were talking with Judge Herford. Do you think he would have left you?”
Faunce lifted his head at that, staring off into space with an unseeing look, his hands twitching nervously.
“No!” he said at last, hoarsely. “No, I can’t say so. He was a brave man, and I—is there any way of escaping a seizure like that? I’m ashamed of it. I’ve suffered horribly; but I—I have a horrible feeling that I might do it again, if I had to face it like that. I couldn’t have stood up to a fight. You—did you suspect me when you told that story of the soldier in the Philippines?”
The doctor was sitting with the tips of his fingers nicely fitted together. He seemed, at the moment, to be deeply engaged with them.
“I can’t say I did. I don’t think I had ever imagined just your situation, though I saw that you had something weighing on your mind.”
“It has nearly driven me mad! I can’t tell you why I did it. I obeyed an impulse, a madness. If I hadn’t we should both be down there now. My staying wouldn’t have saved him. You see how it was? You understand?”
“I understand that you obeyed a pretty universal instinct of self-preservation.”
“That was it!” cried Faunce eagerly. “It was an impulse. I wanted to live—God knows I wanted to live! I was willing to fight to live!”
The doctor nodded, silently watching him with a kind of curiosity that suggested a naturalist’s minute interest in a noisome insect.
“I wanted to live,” Faunce repeated. “It didn’t seem to be wrong to want to save myself.”
“Does it seem so now?”
Faunce raised a haggard face.
“It’s no longer a question of right or wrong with me. It’s no longer a question of life or death. I’m haunted!”
Gerry gave him a keen glance.
“I see—it has reached a point that’s worse than staying behind to die?”
Faunce rose and began to walk the floor again. The lamp on the table had nearly burned out, and the corners of the room were gloomy. The odd bits of pottery and an old skull—brought from some ancient excavations—gleamed uncannily in the shadows. The doctor, before the fire, refused to look in his direction now, and Faunce came back at last with a cry of desperation.
“It haunts me!” he repeated with a smothered groan. “I’ve told you in hope that I could exorcise the demon. I had to tell you! When I sleep I dream of it; when I’m awake I can still see it—that frozen waste and—Overton!”
Gerry nodded his head thoughtfully.
“It’s killing me!” Faunce went on. “I can’t sleep naturally. I’ve increased the dose, but I can’t sleep long. Look at my hands now!”
As he held them out, they were shaking like the hands of a palsy patient. Dr. Gerry eyed them; then he looked up keenly into the haggard face and wild eyes.
“And you’ve just asked a young girl to marry you!”
Faunce was silent. The older man’s tone was tinged with a contempt that stung him. He seemed to rally his forces, to pull himself together.
“I was a fool to tell you all this—a fool! It got hold of me—I don’t know what I’m doing when it gets hold of me. I came here to ask for something to make me sleep, and I’ve—I’ve stripped my soul naked!”
He was shaking again. The doctor rose and put his hand on the younger man’s shoulder.
“Go over there and lie down on the lounge. I’ll give you something. If you don’t sleep, you’ll presently go to a madhouse. Lie down!”
Faunce stared, at first unyieldingly; but he was exhausted, and long hours of sleeplessness had wrecked his nerves. He turned without a word and threw himself on the lounge, burying his head in his arms. A smothered sob shook him from head to foot.
The doctor, measuring out a dose and approachinghim, touched his shoulder sharply. Faunce groaned.
“My God!” he cried wildly. “Why did I do it? Why did I do it?”
The doctor bent down and held the glass to his lips.
“Drink this!” he commanded sharply.
Faunce looked up with glazed eyes, took the cup, and swallowed the narcotic. For a long while afterward he lay there, tossing restlessly. Once or twice he uttered a hoarse exclamation, of which Gerry took no notice.
The doctor sat by the fire, feeding it and listening. After a while he heard the sound of heavy and measured breathing. The narcotic had done its work—the tortured man slept.
Gerry rose quietly, extinguished the lamp, and pulled aside the curtains. It was morning. The storm had passed, and the earth lay under a white mantle. Every tree and every branch bore its feathery burden of snow. Through an exquisite lacework of sparkling ice he could see the wonder of a magnificent sky, still pink with sunrise.
He turned back and looked at the sleeper on the lounge. Faunce lay with one arm above his head, the other across his breast, an elaborate seal-ring on one of the white fingers. His face was slightly flushed, and the beauty of his regular features and fine head had never been more keenly revealed. He might easily pose as a hero of romance.He had all the outer attributes—physical strength, unusual beauty of features, and grace of manner—and he had won distinction by his service in the antarctic.
The doctor turned with a gesture of bewilderment and started to go up-stairs. As he did so, he heard some one at the door. Concluding that it must be an early patient, or perhaps a more or less urgent call, he went back, and, shutting the door of his study, locked Faunce in. Then he went himself to answer the ring.
On his door-step, muffled in furs, radiant and sparkling, stood Diane Herford. The doctor was guilty of a start of surprise. She saw it and smiled.
“The storm has torn down the wires, and I couldn’t phone,” she explained. “I want you to come over to breakfast. Papa’s not so well.”
He was aware of a feeling that was almost panic. Nothing on earth could be worse than that she should suspect Arthur Faunce’s state at that moment.
“I can’t come over to breakfast, Di,” he replied gruffly, drawing her out of the frosty air into the little entry. “What’s wrong with the judge? He was better yesterday.”
“He got excited and tried to do too much. He’s all bent over, and you know how he hates that. You’ve really got to come!”
She was standing in the hall, almost leaningagainst the study door, her dark furs enhancing the beauty of her bright skin and the charm of her eyes.
“I’ll come over presently. Put a hot-water bag on his back,” advised the doctor, with a haunting subconsciousness of the man on the lounge.
“Oh, but I want you to come to breakfast!” she argued. “Why can’t you come?”
He pretended to be angry.
“Why can’t I? I’ve been up all night, my girl, and I want my own way this morning?”
She commiserated him.
“I’m so sorry—what a shame! Of course you must rest. Papa isn’t really so ill, only I—I”—she hesitated with a charming smile—“I’ve got something to tell you!”
He turned a searching look on her.
“Yes?”
“I’m engaged to be married.”
She paused, waiting for him to guess herfiancé; but he remained obstinately silent.
“To Arthur Faunce,” she told him.
The doctor forced himself to hold out both hands to meet hers.
“You want me to congratulate you?” he demanded bruskly. “I sha’n’t! I’m going to congratulate him, instead. That’s the way to look at it.”
She laughed.
“Papa’s pleased, and I’m so glad that he is!But I won’t keep you from your rest now. Come over to lunch, instead of breakfast.”
She moved toward the door, her eyes smiling at him. There was something about her that seemed, to the doctor, not wholly happy. There was a tremulous note in her voice, and her eyes were too bright. They were at the door, and he suddenly laid his fatherly hand on her shoulder.
“Diane, do you love him? Are you following your heart?”
She did not answer immediately. Her gaze dwelt on the wide, snowy landscape before them. Then she looked up, and an exquisite blush softened her face.
“Yes,” she replied slowly, but with an engaging candor. “I couldn’t marry for any reason but that. I—I’m following my heart.”