"In the night--in the long, horrible night." Though she was alive to the dramatic import of her words and this scene, she was speaking with sincerity, and she shuddered.
Eades stood and looked at her. He could do nothing else; he could say nothing, think nothing.
In Elizabeth's heart there was now but one desire, and that was to get away, to bring this horror to an end. She had come to save her brother; now she was conscious that she must save herself; she felt that she had hopelessly involved the situation; it was beyond remedy now, and she must get away. She rose.
"I have come here, I have humiliated myself to ask you to do a favor for me," she said. "You are not ready to do it, I see." She was glad; she felt now the dreadful anxiety of one who is about to escape an awful dilemma. "To me it seems a very simple little thing, but--"
She was going.
"Elizabeth!" he said, "let me think it over. I can not think straight just now. You know how I want to help you. You know I would do anything--anything for you!"
"Anything but this," she said. "This little thing that hurts no one, a thing that can bring nothing but happiness to the world, that can save my father and my mother and me--a thing, perhaps the only thing that can save my poor, weak, erring brother--who knows?"
"Let me think it over," he pleaded. "I'll think it over to-night--I'll send you word in the morning."
She turned then and went away.
XXVII