“If you are going to die to-night, then I will not. Your presence would poison the very valley of death for me.”
“You meant to die—you? Deirdre, have I brought you to such a pass? Forgive me—forgive me.” He grovelled on the floor clutching at my skirt, kissing my feet, but I thrust him away.
“Forgive me—I did not mean to do it—some madness entered into me—I loved the little thing, Deirdre—I loved it—I used to lie in the dark with it against my face, and think it was a little child—your child.”
Black vultures flew into the room then; the air was darkened with their wings. They filled the hut rustling and beating. They flapped about me, with cruel beaks plucking at my heart. Through the trailing of their dusky wings I saw the tortured face of the man on the floor. And across the room the great eyes of Mary accused not him, but me.
“Get up, Maurice,” I said to him at last. Now that I knew that the sweet rest and peace of death were not for me a great weariness crept over my spirit. “Get up! Do not kneel to me. You make me ashamed.”
“Give me another chance, Deirdre. May God curse and afflict me root and branch, if I do not change from what I am. Give me one more chance.”
I held out my hand to him, while the floor swayed under my feet.
“This is a deep, terrible pit—we are in—Maurice.” I stammered, hardly having strength to speak. “We must try and help each other—to climb out of it—together.”
Looking past him out through the open door, into the grey weeping morning I saw a vista of long weary years.