“Denny,” said Jane, “for my sake you will not touch the wireless.”
“I’m giving the orders!” roared Cleigh.
“Wait a moment!” said Jane. “You spoke of your word. That first night you promised me any reparation I should demand.”
“I made that promise. Well?”
“Give him his eight months.”
She gestured toward the sea, toward the spot where they had last seen the Haarlem.
“You demand that?”
“No, I only ask it. I understand the workings of that twisted soul, and you don’t. Let him have his queer dream—his boyhood adventure. Are you any better than he? Were those treasures honourably yours? Fie! No, I won’t demand that you let him go; I’ll only ask it. Because you will not deny to me what you gave to those little children—generosity.”
Cleigh did not speak.
“I want to love you,” she continued, “but I couldn’t if there was no mercy in your sense of justice. Be merciful to that unhappy outcast, who probably never had any childhood, or if he had, a miserable one. Children are heartless; they 275 don’t know any better. They pointed the finger of ridicule and contempt at him—his playmates. Imagine starting life like that! And he told me that the first woman he loved—laughed in his face! I feel—I don’t know why—that he was always without care, from his childhood up. He looked so forlorn! Eight months! We need never tell him. I’d rather he shouldn’t know that I tried to intercede for him. But for him we three would not be here together, with understanding. I only ask it.”