“This will make you ill, sweet,” he said, “I had better go—yes—I’ll write. God bless you! Good-bye!”
He did not know how he got out of the room, how he left her, or where. Everything swam in a mist before his eyes, but at last he found himself on the stairs, going down slowly and deliberately, and trying to pull his gloves on to his hands. A man passed him at the foot of the stairs, and stopped in his ascent to look after him.
CHAPTER XXV
Giles stepped outside, and turned indifferently to the left. A few paces down the street was a public-house, he turned into it, and calling for a glass of brandy drank it off at a gulp. As he was coming out a man touched him smartly on the shoulder from behind. He turned round, and saw Nielsen. He was panting slightly from emotion or haste, his eyes had a red and angry look, and he planted his square figure firmly on the pavement in front of Legard.
“Lōōk here, you know,” he said, “this will not do, this is not the thing, you know, Monsieur Legard”—the words tumbled over each other grotesquely in his anger: “C’est une lâcheté vous savez, c’ que vous avez fait là.”
“What?” said Giles; he stood with clenched hands before the other, and his face was set and savage-looking.
“This, what you have done to Miss Ley, to that angel. What is it you have said to her to make her cry? Pardieu! C’est un peu trop fort.”
Giles’s face quivered at the words, then was instantly hard again. He looked at the other, with his jaw thrust forward.
“What is it to you?” he said.
He felt grateful for the sensation of anger. By nature very gentle, at this moment he felt a savage enjoyment.