“Well, I don’t,” said Cuthbert, in his dry, gentle voice. “You know, I promised to see you through.”
“It eases me so to have you know it. But no one else—promise me—no one else.”
“Well—but your best help in the fight would be the doctor.”
“Oh yes—you may tell him anything you like, anything you can. The real thing is past man’s understanding. Only,” and he collected his strength, and looked up again steadfastly, “remember—devil or delusion—it is not irresistible, and I can resist.”
When Guy, soothed by his friend’s sympathy, had dropped into a much-needed sleep, Cuthbert still sat beside him puzzled, and, spite of himself, awed by the terrible story. He could not forget the records of that earlier struggle, which had come into his hands, and which Guy must see, as soon as he was fit to do so. He did not understand the experience enough to see why, as he put it, in the half-jesting thought with which deep feeling veils itself, Guy preferred the devil to a delusion. But he saw that mind and soul and body were all in danger, and he recognised that the belief in a resisting power must be fostered and guarded to the utmost.
“Only his faith can save him,” thought Cuthbert, with a mental start at the familiar ring of words, of which he had never made any personal application.
“It’s beyond me,” he thought, “and I’ll take off my hat and wait. He may be crazed, but he’s pretty much of a hero. And as for disliking him—well—not much fear of it. I’ll do all I know for him.”
Then Cuthbert thought the whole matter through, from beginning to end, and finally, with wise and uncommon mental patience, made up his mind not to rush in like a fool, where a man of any ordinary experience might well fear to tread. He would take every care of Guy; but, in that unknown region of his trial, he would let him judge for himself.