“Captain Grantley,” says I, warningly.
“You must forgive my bluntness, madam,” he continued, “but I, a fool, have been compelled to suffer greatly at your hands. You may have forgotten last year in London, and this very room but a week ago, but I can assure you, madam, that I have not. I have passed through a purgatory of hope and jealousy, and for what reason, madam? Simply that, to serve your private ends, you have deigned to shoot a few smiles out of your eyes. And under your pardon, madam, I will say those eyes of yours are poisoned daggers that corrupt everything they strike. At least, I know they have corrupted my very soul.”
He ended this strange speech with a groan. There was a still passion in him that was alarming. If ever a man meant mischief, surely this was he.
“But, sir,” I said, “you must understand that I am not pleading for myself.”
“No, only for the man you love,” says he.
I saw he was white to the lips.
“Sir,” says I, “if this were not so nonsensical, I should deem it an impertinence.”
“It is only to saints that plain truths are inoffensive,” the Captain answered.
Again and yet again I returned to the attack, only to discover that I had to deal with a cold man kindled. Here was a person not to be fired easily; a chance spark would not light him; but once ablaze and he would not cease burning until the whole of him was ashes. I had only to look at his face observantly to find proofs of the havoc I had caused. His eyes were bright and hollow; his cheeks had fallen in. Hitherto I had held these the signs of the mind’s anxiety at his long captivity and his prisoner’s escape. But had I plumbed deeper to the sources of his malady I should have found that they sprang from the bitter sufferings of his heart. And whatever the shining qualities of this gentleman, I knew from the beginning that magnanimity was not among them. He had endured the pain that I had wantonly inflicted on him, bravely and proudly, but he had also abided his time. Alas, that his time was now!
Looking at his cold eyes, and the scorn of his lips, I knew that he meant to punish me. There was not one relenting glance to give me hope. I do not think that I am a greater coward than my sisters, but somehow all at once I felt my courage go. This patient foe seemed too powerful and wary; I was but as a reed in his hands; he could break me now and cast me to the ground. I shall not describe my long, fervent pleadings with him. I was made to command and not to pray; therefore, I believe a creature of a humbler mind would have borne this matter more effectively. For my every plea fell on a heart of stone. At last I cried out from the depths of desperation: “Is there no price in the world that would tempt you to spare him?”