“Demon,” whispers Lilian, hoarsely, gazing at him in set, stony despair.
“I am just what you and he have made me. It is your own doing. You know I was never one of your godly lot. If a man does me an ill turn I repay it with interest, that is, if I am in a position to do so, which, in this case, fortunately I am. Five o’clock”—glancing at his watch—“I shall just have time to beat up my informant and take him round to the Public Offices before the magistrate goes away, or the Clerk of the Peace will do as well; and by making his deposition this evening we can get a warrant out and save the whole night by it. So you will soon see our friend again, Lilian, sooner than you expected, eh? Now good-bye for the present. I am sorry you have driven me to this, but—” and he moves towards the door. Before he can reach it, she throws herself in front of him. He cannot leave the room without actual violence.
“Stop! Have you no mercy? No pity—for me—for me whom you once professed to love?” and the clear accents of her voice are wrung with despair—with a sense of her utter helplessness.
“None for him. None. Less than none. I hate the man who has robbed me of you. He shall die, and I will go and witness his last struggles.”
“No. Spare him, Ralph, spare him! In killing him you will be killing me. Ah, God! Why was I ever sent into this world? I am the destruction of all whom I would gladly die for!” and she presses her hands tightly upon her temples, and a tremor of hopeless agony shakes the tall, beautiful figure.
Even the heart of that fiend in human shape smites him as he witnesses her awful grief, listens to her wild, despairing accents. But she is playing into his hands now—perfectly. At one time he almost thought the game a lost one, and was about to throw it up, when lo! one false move, and it is entirely his own.
“All whom you would gladly die for,” he repeats, echoing her words. “Would you, then, die for this fellow?”
“God knows I would—a hundred times over,” she wails.
“Well then, listen. I will not require you to do that. What I require you to do is to live for him.”
She looks up quickly—her face transformed in wonderment, which is on the point of breaking out into joy. He is relenting.