"And I've got to sit here while you unwind your jaw! Cut it short. Don't see why you want to chin, anyway. All that's left is to haul me to the scrapheap. . . . You don't think I'd go near her after this, do you? I've got a little decency left. Only thing I can do is to open wide and cut loose. D.T. finish is the one for me. Won't take long for her to forget me. Any fool can see that."
"We're going up to Michamac, first thing tomorrow," remarked Griffith in a casual tone.
"You may be. I'm not."
"It's all arranged, Tammas," drawled Lord James. "I told Miss Leslie—"
"You told her! Mighty friendly of you! Good thing, though. Sooner she knows just what I am, the better. How soon do you figure on the wedding?"
"Chuck it, you duffer!" exclaimed the Englishman, flushing scarlet. "I didn't tell her this. She doesn't know."
Blake's haggard face lighted with a flash of hope, only to settle back into black despair.
"She'll learn soon enough. I'm done for, for good, this trip!" he groaned. He clenched his fist and bent forward to glare at them in sullen fury. "Damn you! Call yourselves my friends, and sit here yawping, you damned Job's comforters! Think I'm a mummy?—when I've lost her! God!—to sit here with my brains going—to know I've lost all—all! Give me some whiskey—anything! … My girl—my girl!"
He bent over, writhing and panting, in an agony of remorse.
Griffith fetched a tablet and a glass of water, to which he added some of the quassia.