“With that discovery the whole case took a different aspect. It hurt less to think of Paulina—and yet it hurt more. The tinge of bitterness, of doubt, in my thoughts of her had had a tonic quality. It was harder to go on persuading myself that I had done right as, bit by bit, my theories crumbled under the test of time. Yet, after all, as she herself had said, one could judge of results only in the long run....
“The Trants stayed away for two years; and about a year after they got back, you may remember, Trant was killed in a railway accident. You know Fate’s way of untying a knot after everybody has given up tugging at it!
“Well—there I was, completely justified: all my weaknesses turned into merits! I had ‘saved’ a weak woman from herself, I had kept her to the path of duty, I had spared her the humiliation of scandal and the misery of self-reproach; and now I had only to put out my hand and take my reward.
“I had avoided Paulina since her return, and she had made no effort to see me. But after Trant’s death I wrote her a few lines, to which she sent a friendly answer; and when a decent interval had elapsed, and I asked if I might call on her, she answered at once that she would see me.
“I went to her house with the fixed intention of asking her to marry me—and I left it without having done so. Why? I don’t know that I can tell you. Perhaps you would have had to sit there opposite her, knowing what I did and feeling as I did, to understand why. She was kind, she was compassionate—I could see she didn’t want to make it hard for me. Perhaps she even wanted to make it easy. But there, between us, was the memory of the gesture I hadn’t made, forever parodying the one I was attempting! There wasn’t a word I could think of that hadn’t an echo in it of words of hers I had been deaf to; there wasn’t an appeal I could make that didn’t mock the appeal I had rejected. I sat there and talked of her husband’s death, of her plans, of my sympathy; and I knew she understood; and knowing that, in a way, made it harder.... The door-bell rang and the footman came in to ask if she would receive other visitors. She looked at me a moment and said ‘Yes,’ and I got up and shook hands and went away.
“A few days later she sailed for Europe, and the next time we met she had married Reardon....”
VI
It was long past midnight, and the terrier’s hints became imperious.
Merrick rose from his chair, pushed back a fallen log and put up the fender. He walked across the room and stared a moment at the Brangwyn etching before which Paulina Trant had paused at a memorable turn of their talk. Then he came back and laid his hand on my shoulder.