"Glad! Glad, when it left not a moment for preparation to meet that God whom he feared! when it left not a moment for a word of farewell to the girl whom he loved! Glad! Good God! I had rather suffer a life-time of anguish than to die like that—a rat in a trap!"
"And you buried him down there?" his pitiless interlocutor continued.
"Yes," he answered, half sullenly. "What else was there to do?"
"Why not bring him home to the girl he loved, and who loved him?"
"Like that! It were a thousand times, ten thousand times, better that she never saw him again. Besides," managing by a superhuman effort to control himself somewhat, "there was no way. It was awful getting through, myself, and it would have been impossible with him. There were miles and miles that had to be done on mule-back, and miles and miles more, even after we reached the railroad, that had to be done on a hand-car. Then there were land-slides that had to be walked over and the car carried. Oh, it would have been impossible, quite impossible, even if—if—"
"If what?"
"If I had desired to," he blurted out, hastily, hoarsely. "I will come again tomorrow—tomorrow—when, I hope, Miss de Barryos will be better. Good-night."
He bolted from the room, snatched up his hat and coat in the hall, and rushed into the street.
Already the lamps were lighted, flickering brilliantly in the deadened gray of the gloaming that was so rapidly fading into night. Pedestrians were hurrying homeward, their faces cut to crimson by the sharp, frosty air.
The sting of it was pleasant to Pierrepont. He opened his mouth and drank it into his lungs with the same relish that a thirsty man drinks water.