“Do you know that it may wreck my future to leave London tonight?”
“Yes,” said Hal. “I know.”
“And after all Lorraine did not help me to this hour of success, am I to throw away my chance?”
“Lorraine is dying. Her dying wish is to see you once more. Is it necessary to discuss anything else?”
Again there was silence between them—silence so intense, so poignant, it was like a live thing present in the room. Through the double windows came a far-off, muffled sound of the traffic in the Strand, but it seemed to have nothing whatever to do with the life of that quiet room. It did not disturb the silence, in which one could almost hear pulse beats. It belonged to another world.
Once Alymer raised his head and looked hard into her face. In his eyes there was an expression of utter hopelessness. She had not spoken any word of reproach or scorn, yet everything about her as she stood there erect and passionless, and without one grain of sympathy for his struggle, told him that, just as far as her natural broadness allowed her to condemn any one, she condemned him.
For a moment a sort of savage recklessness seized him. He felt suddenly he was stranded high-and-dry on a barren rock, with nothing at all any more in his world but his profession. He had lost all hope of ever winning Hal, which seemed to be all hope of anything worth having. Nothing remained but the hollow interest of a great name, and the lust of power. He had it in his mind for those brief, passionate moments, because he had lost all else, to insist upon taking his chance.
Even one day’s grace might save him. The trial would perhaps last not more than two, but in any case, a wire reaching him in the middle, which he could show to Sir Philip, might mean all the difference between success and failure. The wire could be worded to hide what was truly involved, and the plea of a life-and-death urgency would set him free without any awkward questioning.
He glanced up to speak, and once again Hal’s attitude arrested him. She looked so young, so fresh, so true, so vaguely splendid, in spite of the rigid lips that seemed to have closed down tightly upon all she must have suffered in the last forty-eight hours.
She was not looking at him now, but, with her head thrown back a little, she gazed silently and fatefully at the clock on his mantelpiece.