"Even the Judge was upset when he had to sentence her. The court was full of women—I told you the case had attracted a lot of attention—but thank God they were rendered miserable by their presence there in the end. When she heard her sentence—eighteen months in the second division—she couldn't grasp it at first—and then just as I was beginning to feel I must do something or I should go mad, she fainted clean away and was carried out insensible."
"Oh, Mr. Herrick,"—Toni, her eyes full of tears, spoke impetuously—"how terrible for you—for you both! Did you go to her and try to comfort her?"
He was silent for a long moment. Then—
"That was the worst of all." His voice was grim. "When once she realised that she was helpless, that she was to be kept in prison, against her will, for eighteen long months, all her love for me turned to hate. By a queer, perverted instinct she blamed me for everything that had happened. She persisted in asserting that I could have saved her if I would. It was quite useless for me to say anything. I was allowed to see her once more—with my solicitor—and she heaped reproaches on my head till my blood ran cold. She called me a scoundrel, a coward, because I hadn't succeeded in shifting the blame to my own shoulders. She raged against her fate, swore she wouldn't obey the rules, would starve herself to death—and taunted me with the fact, that while she was suffering, starving, in a prison cell, I should be warm and well-fed at home. She screamed out that she hated me, wished me dead—and my last glimpse of her was as she disappeared, her face distorted with passion till all the soft childish beauty had vanished."
"And she is there now?"
"In prison? Yes."
"But—is the time nearly over?"
"Yes. Four weeks to-day Eva will be set free." He stared out of the window with unseeing eyes. "And then will come the question—what are we to do?"
"To do?" She did not understand.
"Yes. You know, she will never forgive me. In her childish, unreasonable way, she persists in thinking everything that happened was my fault. If I had given her more money, she would not have got into debt. If I hadn't gone to Wales and left her alone she would never have done the thing; and if I had only lied better, the blame would have been mine—and the punishment."