“Not even Deane,” repeated Martin, his wounded arm shaking against the silken counterpane.
Roberts’ eyes were becoming glazed.
“They’d all feel cheap, if they could see us now. Your arms around a corpse—a corpse that strikes to prove itself!” His thin hand pushed against Martin’s broken nose, falling again and again on Martin’s face which failed to recognize the pain. “You love me, though I’m defeated, my dear boy.” He raised his hand once more, but this time it dropped limply to the coverlet. Again the torn brain lost all contact, and he wandered, hesitantly.
“I come before the leisured policies of man. I have these tears, these positive notes of cruelty. Do you want to know?... Smash the hidden casket of Carol, and you’ll find the first. He fed himself with the intolerable dreams of your isolated sanctuary. He cried out of lips as stale as mine. Our Grail was the same, each futile in its own pride. Carol, the bucket. Filled with the residue of my hatred. Murder?—Death?—That’s nothing.... I went to him on a night gray as your eyes. He desired you. His flesh, quite frantically, cried out. Could I stand that? Could I stand the corned stupidity of his mind after you, most beautiful?... I went to him. Deadly and most honestly I threw the passionate, leaden stone into the vacuum of his heart.” Roberts spoke without lips—the ventriloquy of his despair so hurtful and adolescent, so pitifully gay.
“There is a tear for Rio. I’ve seen him follow you with his eyes—that rollicking, healthy sailor! That bold adventurer with the Mongoloid eyes. His bravado is covered with a native strength to hide his shame.” Roberts chuckled hoarsely. “My sinful innocent—never to have seen the colored lechery behind his muscles!... Rio—epitome of flesh—carnality in Mother Goose’s shoes—a bundle of white snow—quite terrified.... I’ve seen his bleak face, whipped by wind and wave, and so have you. But it takes death to bring me the knowledge of his simple, frightened passion. Oh!—he will never fail you, although he doesn’t know why.... Enough of him—enough of his cautious, boastful gallantry which makes one sick when one is well, and makes one laugh when one is sick.” Again the adviser hesitated. Slowly and painfully he turned that he might look at Martin.
“The next tear is for Deane—the one you think you own. You don’t possess her. You hold an empty vase—the artificial movements, smiles and anguish of the woman—all of them as brazen as I, when I first met you. I thought you were the spindle, I the thread. I thought that you were life—an intoxicating bubble in a heavily filled glass. Deeply and amusedly I drank, too late to feel the poison.”
“I’ve saved a tear for Drew. He thought that he was strong enough to escape. But it isn’t ‘escape’ to avoid the thing one loves the most. And so, I know I had the strength not to escape—and I am happier than he....
“The last tear is in a vial that I give you. A tear to use when abstract sorrow’s not enough—a potion you may pour on blistered flesh to lift the crust of tender skin that each swift-moving piston and fast-spinning wheel of man can drive and curve before your fond excitement.
“On myself, you didn’t use a tear. Your hands and mind tore my integument until the bone shows. Watch this!” Roberts, weakened, but fierce, reached for Martin’s hair. There was a brief silence as Martin, his head bowed over the bed, felt the momentary spasm of twisted fingers on his scalp. He did not speak or lift his eyes. As in a dream, he felt the fingers that had clutched his hair so frightfully, become more feeble. There was a gentle, automatic patting against his forehead and he heard deep, horrible sobs....
Roberts put his hands across his eyes.