Taking his prisoner by the shoulders, Hindwood dragged him to the window. With a jerk he tore the ragged curtain from its nails. The downs were a sea of purple dusk. The moon hung like a lantern in an unruffled sky. Against the square of glass, the Major's face showed hawk-like.
“You've changed.” She spoke softly. “Do you remember when last we parted? On the docks at Calcutta. It hurt. Since then we've both gone down the ladder. For both of us it was the end of goodness. I must have known it. I waved till long after you were out of sight; then I wept till my heart was shriveled up. How long I've waited to tell you what you've made me suffer! You made me feel that I'd never been your wife, only a half-caste plaything. But you'd put a white soul into my body. It was a greater wickedness than anything I have done. Now that I'm what you've made me, father of my dead child, you seek me out to be my judge.”
Her hoarse voice died away. Like the protest of an uneasy conscience, the Major's handcuffs clinked together.
“You think that you're just,” she began again. “You come of a race which admires justice. Ah, but justice is not kindness! You knew what I was when you brought me from the temple—a wanton slave-girl. What had I learned of righteousness? It wasn't for my virtue that you bought me. It was for my pomegranate lips, my golden body, my little, caressing hands. Afterward, as an incentive to desire, it pleased you to bring the soul into my eyes. You made me long to be perfect. You seemed so strong and wise; I wanted to be like you. Without you I was afraid. You were my God. I felt brave when I touched you.”
Her voice sank. “After the little one came, I was no longer frightened. He was so nearly white. He was yours and mine. My blood seemed cleansed. I saw the world through the innocence of his eyes. The evil of the East ceased to call to me. But when he was killed and you put me from you—— Murderer of a woman's faith,” she addressed the silent face, “the soul in me was dying.”
She rocked in the shadows. “My crimes are yours, and you came to condemn me. You robbed me of everything but my body. My heart was famished; to feed it, I sold my beauty at a price. At first, for men's money; then, for their honor; at last, for their lives.” She had risen. “You wonder why for their lives? They were men like you, outwardly just, who destroyed belief in goodness. Because of men like you women's hearts are broken and children go naked.”
Hindwood leaped to his feet, blocking her path. She leaned past him, staring down into the bandaged face.
“Oh, husband without pity, god whom I worshipped, I burn in hell because of your justice.”
Slipping to her knees, she came into the square of light. “Am I not beautiful? Is there another like me? Would it not have been happier to have been kind? See what you have spoiled.”