“It is rather an awkward time for you to have to get away,” he ventured.
“It is.” Hallam’s tone became more constrained. He moved restlessly, and looked beyond the speaker out at the changing scenery. “But at least I can’t help by remaining,” he added. Abruptly he brought his gaze back again and looked steadily into the other’s eyes with an expression that was faintly apologetic. “I haven’t recovered from the shock yet,” he said. “I’m worried.”
Garfield nodded sympathetically.
“My dear fellow, of course. It’s not surprising that you should be. If we can do anything, let us know. And if you want a chat come along to our compartment; we’re only next door. I’m taking the wife to the Falls. It’s her first visit. I expect we’ll put in about a couple of weeks there. Do you go as far?”
“I’m going farther,” Hallam answered briefly. But, although Garfield looked inquiry, he did not give him any more definite information in regard to his destination.
Hallam had started on his journey with no thought of deserting his wife and leaving his home for ever: he had come away simply because he felt the imperative necessity for change and solitude. The man’s mind was dark with despair. This feeling of despair deepened with every passing hour. Fear held him in its grip. He mistrusted himself. The horror of what had happened haunted him night and day; he could not sleep for thinking of it. Always before his mind’s eye was the picture of his wife—falling—falling headlong—striking the ground with a thud—lying still and white at the foot of the stairs, with the dark stain under her head slowly spreading on the darker wood of the floor...
How had this thing happened? How had he come to lose control of himself completely? He ought not to have married her. He had done her an irreparable injury by tying her life to his...
Throughout the long hot days he sat in his compartment and brooded, and when the gold merged with the evening purple, and the purple deepened to night, he stretched himself on his bunk, and lay looking out at the star-strewn sky through the unshuttered windows, and brooded still with a mind too distraught to rest.
He believed that some brain sickness was coming upon him; he felt wretchedly ill; and from the way in which people stared at him when he entered the dining-car he judged that his appearance evidenced his physical and mental debility. Although he forced himself to go to meals he ate little; he had no appetite for food; the smell and the sight of it nauseated him.
He began to think that he would be compelled to leave the train: the confined space and the heat were making him ill. He found himself falling into the habit of talking to himself. This development horrified him no more than it horrified Mrs Garfield, who overheard him, and communicated her fear to her husband that Hallam was mad. His proximity made her nervous. She lay awake the greater part of one night listening to his mutterings, and fell asleep with the dawn and slept heavily until breakfast time. It came as a great relief to her to discover later that Hallam had left the train in the early morning.