“No,” said I. “Good-by.”
I heard him ring off, but I sat there for several minutes, the receiver still to my ear. I was muttering: “Langdon, Langdon—why—why—why?” again and again. Why had he turned against me? Why had he plotted to destroy me—one of those plots so frequent in Wall Street—where the assassin steals up, delivers the mortal blow, and steals away without ever being detected or even suspected? I saw the whole plot now—I understood Tom Langdon's activities, I recalled Mowbray Langdon's curious phrases and looks and tones. But—why—why—why? How was I in his way?
It was all dark to me—pitch-dark. I returned to the smoking-room, lighted a cigar, sat fumbling at the new situation. I was in no worse plight than before—what did it matter who was attacking me? In the circumstances, a novice could now destroy me as easily as a Langdon. Still, Ball's news seemed to take away my courage. I reminded myself that I was used to treachery of this sort, that I deserved what I was getting because I had, like a fool, dropped my guard in the fight that is always an every-man-for-himself. But I reminded myself in vain. Langdon's smiling treachery made me heart-sick.
Soon Anita appeared—preceded and heralded by a faint rustling from soft and clinging skirts, that swept my nerves like a love-tune. I suppose for all men there is a charm, a spell, beyond expression, in the sight of a delicate beautiful young woman, especially if she be dressed in those fine fabrics that look as if only a fairy loom could have woven them; and when a man loves the woman who bursts upon his vision, that spell must overwhelm him, especially if he be such a man as was I—a product of life's roughest factories, hard and harsh, an elbower and a trampler, a hustler and a bluffer. Then, you must also consider the exact circumstances—I standing there, with destruction hanging over me, with the sense that within a few hours I should be a pariah to her, a masquerader stripped of his disguise and cast out from the ball where he had been making so merry and so free. Only a few hours more! Perhaps now was the last time I should ever stand so near to her! The full realization of all this swallowed me up as in a great, thick, black mist. And my arms strained to escape from my tightly-locked hands, strained to seize her, to snatch from her, reluctant though she might be, at least some part of the happiness that was to be denied me.
I think my torment must have somehow penetrated to her. For she was sweet and friendly—and she could not have hurt me worse! If I had followed my impulse I should have fallen at her feet and buried my face, scorching, in the folds of that pale blue, faintly-shimmering robe of hers.
“Do throw away that huge, hideous cigar,” she said, laughing. And she took two cigarettes from the box, put both between her lips, lit them, held one toward me. I looked at her face, and along her smooth, bare, outstretched arm, and at the pink, slender fingers holding the cigarette. I took it as if I were afraid the spell would be broken, should my fingers touch hers. Afraid—that's it! That's why I didn't pour out all that was in my heart. I deserved to lose her.
“I'm taking you away from the others,” I said. We could hear the murmur of many voices and of music. In fancy I could see them assembled round the little card-tables—the well-fed bodies, the well-cared-for skins, the elaborate toilets, the useless jeweled hands—comfortable, secure, self-satisfied, idle, always idle, always playing at the imitation games—like their own pampered children, to be sheltered in the nurseries of wealth their whole lives through. And not at all in bitterness, but wholly in sadness, a sense of the injustice, the unfairness of it all—a sense that had been strong in me in my youth but blunted during the years of my busy prosperity—returned for a moment. For a moment only; my mind was soon back to realities—to her and me—to “us.” How soon it would never be “us” again!
“They're mama's friends,” Anita was answering. “Oldish and tiresome. When you leave I shall go straight on up to bed.”
“I'd like to—to see your room—where you live,” said I, more to myself than to her.
“I sleep in a bare little box,” she replied with a laugh. “It's like a cell. A friend of ours who has the anti-germ fad insisted on it. But my sitting-room isn't so bad.”