“He was a young man?”
“Yes. Tall. Curly hair. A fine-looking young man. And very refined. His family... but, my God, you—”
“You must keep quiet!”
“Keep quiet! I'd like to know how, when you keep me in suspense like this!” She was on her feet now.
“I am going to tell you. But you must control yourself. Mr. Beggins must be the young engineer who tried to help the people in the compound.”
“He was killed?”
“Quiet! Yes, he was killed. I buried him this morning.”
Then the young woman's nerves gave way utterly, Doane found his mind divided between the cold thought of leaving her, perhaps asking the magistrate to give her an escort down to Ting Yang or up through the wall to Peking, and the other terribly strong impulse to stay. It was clear that she was not—well, a good woman; excitingly clear. She said odd things. “Well, see where this mess leaves me!” for one. And, “What's to become of me? Do I just stay out here? Die here? Is this all?”... When, daring a lull in the scene she was making he undertook to go, she clung to him and sobbed on his shoulder. The young engineer had meant little in her life. Her present emotion was almost wholly fright.
He knew, then, that he couldn't go. He was being swept toward destruction. It seemed like that. He could think coolly about it during the swift moments. He could watch his own case. One by one, in quick-flashing thoughts, he brought up all the arguments for morality, for duty, for common decency, and one by one they failed him. Something in life was too strong for him. Something in his nature.... This, then was the natural end of all his brooding, speculating, struggling with the demon of unbelief.... And even then he felt the hideously tragic quality of this hour.