“Gloria had met George before we were married,” he said in his quiet voice. “She found him ill, you know, and paid his debts and got him a doctor, and when he was well he wanted to serve her. I didn’t like him and advised her not to take him; it would have been much better for him to go back to his profession, but he begged to come and she liked him; perhaps his devotion flattered her. Everything went well until the night when Gloria was to open in a new play. I never went much to the theatre. I thought it better to leave her alone in her professional life, and on this night the planet Eros—a small planet discovered quite recently in our new solar system—was to be very near—much nearer than it had ever been but once before, much nearer than it would be again for many years. The first time the astronomers of the world had missed a wonderful opportunity; this time they were all watching. We were to take photographs if the weather permitted; by means of Eros and comparative calculations we would discover something exact about the distance and weight of many other planets. It was the opportunity of a century.
“We had a small flat in London and George was acting as a sort of butler and sometimes valeting me as well. I hated having him around, but Gloria said he was happier when he was busy. I remember now everything that happened and how he looked at me. ‘You are going to the theatre tonight, Sir?’ he said, and I had the impression that he often gave me, that he was being impertinent, almost insulting, though there was neither impertinence nor insult in his words or manner.
“‘No; I’m due at the observatory,’ I answered. There had been no idea of my going to the opening in my mind, or in Gloria’s, I think, until that moment, but when George had left us she turned on me with reproaches. She said that I took no interest in her work; that I was jealous of her career and that I must choose between her and the stars that night. I dare say I was very stupid, but she seemed quite strange and unreasonable as I had never seen her before, and I said some rather nasty things. She said if I did not go to the theatre she would never return to the flat. Of course I said that was unnecessary—that I would go. I did; expecting a message from her every day. The only message I got was from her lawyers in Paris, where she had gone for a divorce. That’s the story.”
He stopped talking now, but Ruth waited. Over the hills the rose flush had faded, the thin, keen blade of the almost disappearing moon hung like a scimitar in a field of dark purple and resting above it a star hung, trembling, as if waiting for the cold arms of a laggard lover.
“I suppose half confidences won’t do,” he said at last. “I still love Gloria; what man once having loved her could forget? ‘Time cannot change nor custom stale her infinite variety’; but of what use to fight one’s destiny—in another incarnation, perhaps. I cannot believe all that you say of George. That he is a Mahatma is doubtless true, that he loves Gloria is gruesomely natural, that he hates me and has put upon me this mind-born malady is reasonable, but that he should possess, or even aspire to possess, Gloria is incredible.”
There was a sadness on his face, another worldness in his eyes, but there was no light of battle there, and Ruth, whose youth and energy cried out for action, felt as if she were beating with futile hands against a stone wall.
“But he does want her, and he’s going to succeed if you don’t do something. If he has the power to kill you, he has the power to do these other things too. Even if you don’t believe this, you must do something to save your own life.”
“I’m afraid I’m not very keen about living; if I die now it is an easy way out—”
She wanted to protest that if he had courage he might yet win Gloria again, but she did not dare raise hopes that might never be fulfilled. Even if Gloria were saved from the Prince who could tell that she might not marry Terry?
“That’s weak, and cowardly,” she said, “and if you believe in the wisdom of the East you know that in the next life you will not enjoy the fruit of any joy for which you have not struggled in this. You are selfish, too. Even if you no longer care for your own life, you must do what you can to help Gloria.”