Made stupid by her misery, she sat gazing at the floor, her eyes fixed, her lips slightly apart.
She was exhausted; for the same thoughts had besieged her ever since she had read the despatch, “Morrison died this morning,”—an unending repetition of exactly the same sentences, constantly following each other, and constantly beginning again; even in sleep they continued, like a long nightmare, so that she woke weeping. And now without a moment’s respite, while she sat there with her eyes on the carpet, the involuntary recital began anew: “I am a murderer, it is a murderer who is sitting here. If people only knew!”
“They may rail at this life; from the hour I began it
I’ve found it a life full of kindness and bliss;
And until you can show me some happier planet,
More social, more gay, I’ll content me with this,”
chanted Cicely, sweetly.
“The song of last Christmas at Romney,” Eve’s thoughts went on. “Oh, how changed I am since then—how changed! That night I thought only of my brother. Now I have almost forgotten him;—Jack, do you care? All I think of is Paul, Paul, Paul. How beautiful it was in that gray-green wood! But what am I dreaming about? How can the person who killed his brother be anything to him?
—“Once he said—he told me himself—‘I care for Ferdie more than for anything in the world.’ It’s Ferdie I have killed.
—”‘Morrison buried this afternoon. Address me Charleston Hotel, Charleston.’ He put those despatches in his pocket and went into the back room. He sat down by the table, and laid his head upon his arms. His shoulders shook, I know he was crying, he was crying for his brother. Oh, I will go down-stairs and tell him the whole; I will go this moment.” She rose.
On the stairs she met the judge. “Is she worse?” he asked, alarmed at seeing her outside of the room.
“No; the same.”
She found Paul in the lower hall. “Is she worse?” he said.