"I beg of you," she added, "as my friends, to spare me that."
The mist streaming up from the soaked forest lay in the cabin. It gathered about the woman on the floor. Presently she went on:
"I am afraid that I cannot make you see how completely I am done with life, but I will try. So long as one has a thing to love, or a thing to do in this world, the desire to remain here is a strong and moving impulse in him. But when these two things go, that desire also goes. And the loss of it is the sign—the beck to the door. That old wise man made it very clear, I think. He said: 'Another hath made the play, and not thee, and hath given thee thy lines to speak, and thou art not concerned, except to speak them well, and at the end of them to go.... And why shouldst thou wish to remain after that, until He, who conducts the play, shall come and thrust thee off?'"
"Now," she continued, "I have come to the end of my lines. They have not always been very pleasant lines. But I have contrived to speak them with a sort of courage. And I would not now be shamed before the Manager."
She peered through the thickening mist, as through a smoke, straining her eyes to see the face of the man by the door, the girl by the chimney; but she could not, and she tried a further argument.
"You must be fair to me," she said, "look at the situation. I cannot go on, that is certain, and for the two of you to remain here, on my account, is to charge me with your death. Dear me! I have enough on the debit side of the ledger without that."
The woman's head oscillated on her shoulders. Her right hand wrung the fingers of her left. She considered for a moment, her chin fallen on her bosom. Then she sat up, like one under the impulse of some final and desperate hazard.
"I am going to ask each of you a question," she said, "and I entreat you, as one in the presence of death, to answer the truth. And let it be a test between us."
Then she leaned forward, straining through the mist, to the Duke of Dorset.
"My friend," she said, "can you think of any interest in this life that you would like to follow; any plan that you would like to carry out; any hope that you would like to realize? because I cannot, and if you can, it is I, and not you who should remain here."