"Eva!"
"Together. You say yourself that everything in you fails of happiness, and that nevertheless happiness must come from within. Well, it is the same with me. And yet we love each other; do we not?"
"Yes, yes."
"Then why should we remain awake in this weariful life? It is always, always raining. Give me a kiss, Frank. A good night kiss, and let us sleep while it rains. Let me go to sleep in your arms—"
"Eva, what do you mean?" he asked, hoarsely, for he did not understand her.
"I broke the phial—broke it for you," she went on wildly. "But you can always get another?" An icy chill shot through his very marrow like a sudden frost.
"God in heaven, Eva! What do you want?"
She smiled at him calmly, with a soft light in her beaming eyes, and she threw her arms round him.
"To die with you, my dearest," she whispered as in an ecstasy of joy. "What good can life do us? You were right. You can never be happy again, and I can ever be happy with you. And yet I will not leave you, for you are all in all to me. Then how can we live, or why? But, oh, Frank, to die together, in each other's arms! That is the greatest bliss! A kindly poison, Frank, nothing painful. Something easy to take, that we can take together, and clasp each other, and die—die—die—" Frank shuddered with horror.
"No, Eva, no!" he cried. "You must not wish that, you cannot wish that! I forbid it."