"Oh, if I were younger I could drive him away!" came back to her again and again. She found too that her own fear impeded her own self-sacrifice. She hated this shadow as something strong, evil, like mildew on stone, chilling breath. "I'm not brave enough.... I'm not good enough.... I'm not young enough!" Incessantly she tried to determine how real her sensations were. Was she simply influenced by Mrs. Porter's fear? Was it the blindest imagination? Was it bred simply of the close, confined life that they were leading?
She could not tell. They had resumed their conspiracy of silence, of false animation and ease of mind. They led their daily lives as though there was nothing between them. But with every day Mrs. Porter's strength was failing; the look of horrified anticipation in her eyes was now permanent. At night they slept together, and the little frail body trembled like a leaf in Miss Allen's arms.
The appearances were now regularised. Always when they were in the middle of their second game of "Patience" Miss Allen felt that impulse to turn, that singing in her ears, the force of his ironical gaze. He was now almost complete to her, standing in front of the Japanese screen, his thin legs apart, his hostile, conceited face bent towards them, his pale, thin hands extended as though to catch a warmth that was not there.
A Sunday evening came. Earlier than usual they sat down to their cards. Through the open window shivered the jangled chimes of the bells of St. James's.
"Well, he won't come yet ..." was Miss Allen's thought. Then with that her nightly resolve: "When he comes I must not turn—I must not look. She must not know that I know."
Suddenly he was with them, and with a dominant force, a cruelty, a determination that was beyond anything that had been before.
"Four, five, six...." The cards trembled in Mrs. Porter's hand. "And there's the spade, Lucy dear."
He came closer. He was nearer to her than he had ever been. She summoned all that she had—her loyalty, her love, her honesty, her self-discipline. It was not enough.
She turned. He was there as she had always known that she would see him, his cruel, evil, supercilious face, conscious of its triumph, bent toward them, his grey clothes hanging loosely about his thin body, his hands spread out. He was like an animal about to spring.
"God help me! God help me!" she cried. With those words she knew that she had failed. She stood as though she would protect with her body her friend. She was too late.