“I asked you in so many words what you were going to do to her,” he said, in a voice vibrant with emotion. “You will say it is no business of mine. But I am going to make it my business. Good God, Barry, do you think I've seen nothing all these years? Do you think I can sit down and watch history repeat itself and make no effort to avert it for lack of moral courage? I can't. When you were a boy I had to stand aside and see your mother's heart broken, and I'm damned if I'm going to keep silent while you break Gillian's heart. I loved your mother, the light went out for me when she died. For her sake I carried on here, hoping I might be of use to you—because you were her son. And then Gillian came and helped to fill the blank she had left. She honoured me with her friendship, she brought brightness into my life until gradually she has become as dear to me as if she were my own daughter. All I care about is her happiness—and yours. But she comes first, poor lonely child. Why did you marry her if it was only to leave her desolate again? Wasn't her past history sad enough? She was happy here at first, before your marriage. But afterwards—were you blind to the change that came over her? Couldn't you see that she was unhappy? I could. And I tell you I was hard put to it sometimes to hold my tongue. It wasn't my place to interfere, it wasn't my place to see anything, but I couldn't help seeing what was patent to the eye of anybody who was interested. You left her, and you have come back. For what? You are her husband, in name at any rate—oh, yes, I know all about that, I know a great deal more than I am supposed to know, and do you think I am the only one?—legally she is bound to you, though I do not doubt she could easily procure her freedom if she so wished, so I ask you again—what are you going to do? She is wholly in your power, utterly at your mercy. What more is she to endure at your hands? I am speaking plainly because it seems to me to be a time for plain speaking. I can't help what you think, I am afraid I don't care. You've been like a son to me. I promised your mother on her death-bed that I would never fail you, I could have forgiven you any mortal thing on earth—but Gillian. It's Gillian and me, Barry. And if it's a case of fighting for her happiness—by God, I'll fight! And now you know why I have told you all that I have tonight, why I have rendered an account of my stewardship. If you want me to go I shall quite understand. I know I have exceeded my prerogative but I can't help it. I've left everything in order, easy for anybody to take over—” Craven's head had sunk into his hands, now he sprang to his feet unable to control himself any longer. “Peter—for God's sake—” he cried chokingly, and stumbling to the window he wrenched back the curtain and flung up the sash, lifting his face to the storm of wind and rain that beat in about him, his chest heaving, his arms held rigid to his sides.
“Do you think I don't care?” he said at last, brokenly. “Do you think it hasn't nearly killed me to see her unhappiness—to be able to do nothing. You don't know—I wasn't fit to be near her, to touch her. I hoped by going to Africa to set her free. But I couldn't die. I tried, God knows I tried, by every means in my power short of deliberately blowing my brains out—a suicide's widow—I couldn't brand her like that. When men were dying around me like flies death passed me by—I wasn't fit even for that, I suppose.” He gave a ghastly little mirthless laugh that made Peters wince and came back slowly into the room, heedless of the window he had left open, and walked to the fireplace dropping his head on his arm on the mantel. “You asked me just now what I meant to do to her—it is not a question of me at all but what Gillian elects to do. I am going to her tomorrow. The future rests with her. If she turns me down—and you turn me down—I shall go to the devil the quickest way possible. It's not a threat, I'm not trying to make bargains, it's just that I'm at the end of my tether. I've made a damnable mess of my life, I've brought misery to the woman I love. For I do love her, God help me. I married her because I loved her, because I couldn't bear to lose her. I was mad with jealousy. And heaven knows I've been punished for it. My life's been hell. But it doesn't matter about me—it's only Gillian who matters, only Gillian who counts for anything.” His voice sank into a whisper and a long shudder passed over him.
The anger had died out of Peters' face and the old tenderness crept back into his eyes as they rested on the tall bowed figure by the fireplace. He rose and went to the window, shutting it and drawing the curtain back neatly into position. Then he crossed the room slowly and laid his hand for an instant on Craven's shoulder with a quick firm pressure that conveyed more than words. “Sit down,” he said gruffly, and going back to the little table splashed some whisky into a glass and held it under the syphon. Craven took the drink from him mechanically but set it down barely tasted as he dropped again into the chair he had left a few minutes before. He lit a cigarette, and Peters, as he filled his own pipe, noticed that his hands were shaking. He was silent for a long time, the cigarette, neglected, smouldering between his fingers, his face hidden by his other hand. At last he looked up, his grey eyes filled with an almost desperate appeal.
“You'll stay, Peter—for the sake of the place?” he said unsteadily. “You made it what it is, it would go to pieces if you went. And I can't go without you—if you chuck me it will about finish me.”
Peters drew vigorously at his pipe and a momentary moisture dimmed his vision. He was remembering another appeal made to him in this very room thirty years before when, after a stormy interview with his employer, the woman he had loved had begged him to remain and save the property for the little son who was her only hold on life. It was the mother's face not the son's he saw before him, the mother's voice that was ringing in his ears.
“I'll stay, Barry—as long as you want me,” he said at length huskily from behind a dense cloud of smoke. A look of intense relief passed over Craven's worn face. He tried to speak and, failing, gripped Peters' hand with a force that left the agent's fingers numb.
There was another long pause. The blaze of the cheerful fire within and the fury of the storm beating against the house without were the only sounds that broke the silence. Peters was the first to speak.
“You say you are going to her tomorrow—do you know where to find her?”
Craven looked up with a start.
“Has she moved?” he asked uneasily. Peters stirred uncomfortably and made a little deprecating gesture with his hand.