CHAPTER XVIII
THE BETRAYAL
Granger had been sick and delirious for several days as a result of exposure and starvation. Day and night Peggy had nursed him with unwearying attention; one would have supposed that he had been always kind to her, and that she was greatly in his debt. Since his brain had cleared she had said little to him; but, when she touched him, he could feel the thrill of passion that travelled through her hands. Her face told him nothing; it was only when suddenly she raised up her eyes that he saw the longing which they could not hide. Because her eyes betrayed her, she rarely looked at him. He would gladly have spoken with her frankly, but her reserve deterred him, and, moreover, a great anxiety weighed upon his mind—he did not know how many of his secrets and hidden intentions he had let out in his ravings. The altered bearing of his companions made him aware that they had each learnt something fresh about himself, one another, and the manner in which he regarded them. The Man with the Dead Soul was alone unchanged.
So he sat among them on his couch of furs as morosely as Beorn himself, striving to grope his way back into the darkness from which his mind had issued, torturing himself to remember how much his lips had admitted during the time when his vigilance was relaxed. He could only recall the shadows of his words and acts; the real things, which lurked behind the shadows, continually evaded capture. Yet it seemed to him that he must have laid bare all his life, confessing to Eyelids and his sister his every affection and his every treachery, whether accomplished or intended.
Then, if he had done that, he had told Peggy to her face how he was purposing to desert her! It was this suspicion which kept him silent; he waited for her to reveal herself. But she refused to help him; in her looks there was no condemnation, and in her treatment of him nothing but gentleness. Surely there should have been contempt, if she had known all about him!
Two pictures stood out so sharply from the background chaos of his impressions, that he believed them to be veritable memories. The one was of Peggy kneeling at his side, taking him in her arms, as though he were a child, and laying his head upon her breast, and of himself mistaking her for his mother or Mordaunt, and speaking to her all manner of tenderness. The other was of his perpetual terror lest Spurling had gone southward without him, having stolen his share of the treasure; and of one night when Peggy to quiet him had roused up Eyelids, who had brought in Spurling—and Spurling's hands were bound.
When he had come to himself, his first action had been to look round for Spurling—and he was not there. Two days had now passed, and there was still no sign of him. As his strength returned, the fear of his delirium gained ground upon him—lest Spurling had escaped. Brooding over the past with a sick man's fancy, he discovered a new cause for agitation—if Spurling had departed, he would never know the truth about Mordaunt. For the recovery of the gold he scarcely cared now; the apparent actualness of Mordaunt's presence, bending over him in his delirium, had recalled her vividly to his memory, awakening the passion which he had striven to crush down, so that now it seemed all-important to him that he should ask Spurling that one question, "Was the body that was found near Forty-Mile clothed in a woman's dress?"
The return of a certain season, which the mind has associated with a special experience, will often arouse and poignantly concentrate an old emotion, which has been almost forgotten throughout the other months of the year. The arrival of Spurling, and the agony which he had suffered when he had begun to suspect that the woman whom he loved was dead, had happened when the snow was on the ground; perhaps it was the sight of the frozen river and the white landscape which now caused him to remember so furiously the vengeance which he had planned, should Mordaunt prove to be the woman whom Spurling had murdered. So, for the time being, the seeking of El Dorado and preserving of his own life seemed paltry objects when compared with the asking of that question, and the exacting, if need be, of the necessary revenge.
On the third day after the recovery of his senses he could endure his suspicions no longer. Peggy had gone out for a little while; Eyelids was busy in the store; only the Man with the Dead Soul was left with him in the shack. Seizing his opportunity, he got up and dressed. He was so weak that at first he could scarcely stand. Tottering toward the door, he already had his hand upon the latch when Beorn arose and followed him. Though Granger had asked him no question, "I will show you," he said.