Suddenly he closed his eyes, and pictured himself dead and rotting—his flesh pale and bloodless—turning green and ghastly—falling from the bones, hanging in strips from the fingers and stripping like a mask from the face to bare the clenched, grinning teeth.
He opened his eyes with a start; an icy shiver passed through him, and he clenched his hands. But he did not move from his seat.
“God in heaven,” he thought, “I am going mad!”
His tears ceased to flow. And in a moment he was cool and collected once more. It was as if the trouble had passed from him, leaving only a deep earnestness.
And in unconscious effort to protect himself his thoughts turned towards the woman he loved.
He saw her now, in his mind; her lovely figure, her masses of golden hair, her bright, smiling face, and her eyes, that spoke so eloquently when they met his. Involuntarily he smiled.
But no sooner was he conscious of having smiled than the joy was gone, and his face relapsed into the same cold, sad look.
“If she had never seen me,” he thought. “If she had lived far away, or in some other time—then her eyes would have smiled at the sight of another as they do now for me. What is it all worth after all? An accident—a casual chance. Or could it be that, even if both she and I had been different, we should have loved each other still?”
Tears came to his eyes.
“I can never be happy,” he thought again. “Once I was always happy; always sure that the future would bring joy, more joy ... and I never dreamed but that it was good and happy to live. Now I am changed. I cannot understand it all. Everything seems different—even my thoughts are new to me. All changed ... I am like a stranger to myself. And why—what is the cause of it all? Because my father that I believed to be dead comes home alive—and dies.”