But I could not proceed. What I had meant to say was this,—
'And yet, Winnie, I have brought you here to this boulder to die!'
But I could not say it—my tongue rebelled and would not say it.
Winifred was so full of health and enjoyment of life that, courageous as she was. I felt that the prospect of certain and imminent death must appal her; and to see the look of terror break over her face confronting death was what I could not bear. And yet the thing must be said. But at this very moment, when my perplexity seemed direst, a blessed thought came to me—a subterfuge holier than truth. I knew the Cymric superstition about 'the call from the grave,' for had not she herself just told me of it?
'I will turn Superstition, accursed Superstition itself, to account,' I muttered. 'I will pretend that I am enmeshed in a web of Fate, and doomed to die here myself. Then, if I know my Winifred, she will, of her own free mind, die with me.'
'Winnie,' I said, 'I have to tell you something that I know must distress you sorely on my account—something that must wring your heart, dear, and yet it must be told.'
She turned her head sharply round with a look of alarm that almost silenced me, so pathetic was it. On that courageous face I had not seen alarm before, and this was alarm for evil coming to me. It shook my heart—it shook my heart so that I could not speak.
'I felt,' said she, 'that something awful had happened. And it affects yourself, Henry?'
'It affects myself.'
'And very deeply?'