There was a moment of silence. Claire covered her mouth with her hand to suppress a cry. She wanted to shout: "No, no, no, not that, but what I am, my beloved, my adored one."
"What do you mean?" Philip's voice seemed stern.
"I mean that I am indebted to you and Claire for the truth I needed."
Behind the curtain Claire turned on her face and burst into sobs.
Philip arose abruptly. "Lawrence," he said quietly, "I do not know what has happened to you this afternoon; I do not know what you mean; but this I do know: I am deeply sorry if anything I have done or said has made you feel that you are an unwelcome guest in my home."
Lawrence stood up and gathered his scattered senses.
"Philip, I beg your pardon, old man. It isn't that at all. The truth is"—and his voice broke—"I have lied to myself and to the world these many years. Much of it hasn't been my fault, but I must pay the price just the same. I am blind. That has led me to a sort of clamorous egoism which carried me on and on until I came to feel that I was really doing something. At last, I know that I am a narrow human parasite, worthless, utterly worthless. A blind, clinging, grasping, vagrant beast, fed upon the mercy of too kind-hearted humanity. I am sorry. It isn't my fault, but it is so."
Philip stood for a few minutes in silence. "You're ill, Lawrence," he said finally. "Get back to yourself if you can. Things do not stay at this point in human abasement. I know of what I speak. I have been through that myself. I cannot say anything comforting. No one can."
They went to bed with but a few commonplace remarks, and the cabin became silent. Lawrence lay awake through that night. Claire, unknown to him, spent her vigil in a great readjustment of her life.