“That's The most terrible thing,” said Agnes, with an involuntary shudder. “He regards the granting of his life to that man as a worse crime than the one for which he was condemned. I cannot understand that hunger for revenge—that thirst for the blood of a fellow-creature.”
“You cannot understand it because you are a Christian woman,” said Percival. “But for my part I must say that I have the widest sympathy for all people; and no passion, however strange it may seem to others, is quite unintelligible to me. I have lived long enough in queer places to have become impressed with the fact that the civilisation which we profess to regard as a part of ourselves is but the thinnest of veneers—nay, of varnishes. The best of us is but a savage with all the passions—all the nature—of a savage glowing beneath a coat of varnish. My dear Miss Mowbray, we should pray that we may not find ourselves in the midst of such circumstances as put a strain on our civilisation—upon our Christianity.”
She gave another little shudder, she knew not why, and turned her wondering eyes upon him.
“My sympathy with savages is unlimited,” continued Sir Percival. “One should not judge Claude Westwood from the standpoints to which we have accustomed ourselves. It must be remembered that he has lived for years among the worst savages known in the world; and that he has been obliged to struggle for his life after the most savage, that is the most natural, fashion. Nature regards a single life very lightly, and the worst of Nature is that she regards the life of a man as no more sacred than the life of a brute.”
“But we have our Christianity.”
“Thank God that we have that! Pray to God that we may be able to hold the shield of Christianity between ourselves and our nature. I have talked all this cheap philosophy to you—this elementary evolution—only to help you in your hour of need. I take it upon me to advise you unasked, and I would say to you, Do not judge too hastily a man who has lived for so long among barbarians—a man who was compelled to fight for his existence, not with the weapons of civilisation and Christianity, but with the weapons of savagery. In a short time he will once again have become reconciled to the principles of civilisation. He will learn once more to forgive. For the present, pity him.”
He spoke in a low voice, putting out his hand to her. She took his hand, and pressed it. When he turned and went away from her in the direction of his own gates she remained motionless in the road, looking after him. All her thought regarding him took the form of one thought—that he was the noblest man that lived. He sought only her happiness—so much was sure; he had done his best to reconcile her to the man who was his rival, because he believed that she loved that man.
And he had not pleaded in vain. She felt that she had been selfish and inconsiderate in regard to Claude. She had expected him to come to her just as he had left her—to take her into his arms just as he had done on the evening when they had parted. She had been intolerant of his indifference to her on his return—of his thirst for the blood of the man who had taken the life of his brother.
When she entered her house she went to the drawer where she had placed the fragments of his picture. She looked at these evidences of her impatience for a long time, and when she closed the drawer she was consolidated in her resolve to win him back to her—to wait patiently until he chose to return to her; she knew no better way of winning an errant love than by waiting for it to return.
The newspapers, however, were by no means disposed to adopt the policy of patience in respect of a distinguished African explorer who declined to give them any information regarding his travels. They had never found such a desire for retirement to be among the most prominent characteristics of African explorers, and they could not believe that Claude Westwood was sincere in objecting to give any of the representatives of the great organs of public opinion a succinct account of the past nine years of his life—as much copy as would make a couple of columns.