CHAPTER LIV. SINCLAIR LEARNS THE TRUTH AT LAST.
After Koto had left Sinclair he sat down to think. His brain was whirling, for his thoughts and plans were in confusion. His first impulse had been to go straight to Numè; but he had promised Koto to wait until the following day. Now that he was alone, he suddenly remembered Cleo Ballard. Was he free to go, after all? Could he desert Cleo now while she lay so sick and helpless? His joy in the renewed assurance of Numè's love for him had been suddenly tinged with bitter pain. What could he do?
He slept none through the night. In the morning of the next day he hurried over to the hotel and made his usual enquiries after Cleo's health. Mr. and Mrs. Davis, with Tom, had done their best to prevent him from knowing the cause of Orito's suicide. Various reasons had been suggested; and after the first alarm had worn off, and the bodies had been interred with due ceremony, the excitement subsided somewhat, so that they had hopes of the talk quieting down, and perhaps dying out altogether, without the truth reaching Sinclair's ears; for, knowing him to be her betrothed, there were few who were unkind or unscrupulous enough to tell him.
As Sinclair passed through the hotel corridor on his way to the front door, Fanny Morton came down the wide staircase of the hotel. She stopped him as he was going out.
"Let me express my sympathy," she said, sweetly.
"Your sympathy!" he said, coldly; for he did not like her. "I do not understand you, Miss Morton."
"Yes," she cooed. "I am sure I can vouch for Cleo that she never dreamed he would take it so seriously. I was with them on the voyage out, you know, and indeed Cleo often said the passengers were dull. He cheered her up, and—and——"
"Really, Miss Morton, I am at a loss to understand you," he said, curtly.
Fanny Morton showed her colors. There was no suggestion of sweetness in her voice now.
"I mean that every one knows that Mr. Takashima killed himself because he was in love with Miss Ballard; because she let him believe on the boat that she reciprocated his—affection, and the night of the ball she told him the truth. He killed himself, they say, hardly an hour after he had seen her."
Jenny Davis stood right at the back of them. She had heard the woman's venomous words, but was powerless to refute them. Sinclair felt her eyes fixed on him with an entreaty that was pitiful.
He raised his hat to Fannie Morton.
"I will wish you good morning," he said, cuttingly, and that was all.
Then he turned to the other woman.
"Let us go in here," he said, and drew her into a small sitting-room.
"What does that woman mean?" he asked.
Mrs. Davis had broken down.
"We can't keep on pretending any longer, Mr. Sinclair. Yes; it is true, what she says. Poor Cleo did lead him on, thoughtlessly—you know the rest."
A look of dogged sternness began to settle on Sinclair's face.
"Then she was the real cause of——"
"No! no! don't say that. Arthur, she never intended doing any harm. Cleo would not willingly harm anything or any one. She really liked him. Tom will tell you. It was the reason why she never had the heart to tell him—of—of her engagement to you."
For a long time the two sat in moody silence. Then Sinclair said, almost bitterly: "And it was for her that Numè suffered."
"Why, Numè—is—what do you mean?" the other asked, showing signs of hysteria.
"Yes; Mrs. Davis, I know the truth," he said, grimly. "I understand that you thought you were really serving Cleo and myself by acting so—but—well, a man is not cured of love so easily, you know. She (Numè) gave me up because she did not want to spoil a good woman's life, as she thought, after what you told her. This same woman did not scruple to take from her the man who might have comforted her after everything else had failed. Now she is utterly alone."
"I won't say anything now," Mrs. Davis said, bitterly. "I can't defend myself. You would not understand. It is easy to be hard where we do not love;—that is why you have no mercy on Cleo."
"I am thinking of Numè," the man answered.
"May I ask what you intend to do?"
"Last night I was uncertain. This morning, now that I know the truth, things are plain before me. I am going to Numè," he added, firmly.
"But Cleo?" the other almost implored.
"I cannot think of her now."
"But you will have to see her. What can you tell her? We are hiding from her, as best we can, the fact of—of the tragedy. That would kill her; as for your ceasing to care for her, she suspected the possibility of it long ago, and might survive that. Yet how can she know the one without the other?"
Sinclair remained thinking a moment.
"There is only one way. Let her think of me what she will. You are right; if possible the truth—even Takashima's death—must be kept from her so long as she is too weak to bear the knowledge. Can we not have her make the return voyage soon? I will write to her, and though it will sound brutal, I will tell her that the reason why I cannot be more to her than a friend is—because I—I do not love her,—that I love another woman."
Mrs. Davis was weeping bitterly. All her efforts and plans had been of no avail in Cleo's behalf. She saw it now, and did not even try to hold Sinclair.
"Yes," she said, almost wildly. "Go to Numè—she will comfort you. At least your sorrows and hers have ended, now. But as for ours—Cleo's and mine, for I have always loved her better than if she were my own sister—we will try to forget, too."