It Was Marlowe: A Story of the Secret of Three Centuries

by Wilbur Gleason Zeigler

But still he gave no sign of hearing, and she shook his shoulder desperately and turned his face so that his eyes could not but dwell upon her face. Again she spoke sympathizingly:

“At worst, ’twas done in self-defense. The combat was forced upon you. And was not the fatal stroke an accident? Come, come, we can not remain here.”

“Self-defense?” he repeated, questioningly, as though the idea was a new one generated wholly through his own deliberations. “’Twas a duel, and a death in such event is murder,” he added, observing her apparently for the first time.

“Thou couldst not avoid the deed,” she said in remonstrance.

“True, but what of that? Did not Hopton, Renow, and Dalton seek refuge under such a plea without avail? The outcome of a tavern brawl will not be handled by a judge with gloves on. The jury, it is true, can speak but only under the direction of the court.” He seemed talking to himself, but aloud so that she heard him. “The killing of another in a duel is murder on the part of the survivor. And then the infamy of such a trial!”

“But,” she exclaimed, “you may avoid arrest. And as for infamy, the disgrace would be mine. My husband killed by thee and in my apartments.”

At these latter thoughts the look of distress deepened on her face, and the weakness exhibited was in striking contrast with the strength she had displayed in her endeavor to afford him solace. His apparent coldness had also chilled and repelled her, and not understanding the nature of a despair in which he could not give some faint expression of love for her, she sank helpless at his feet.

This movement shook him from his brooding over the far-reaching and distant effect of the fatal stroke, to a consideration of the living reality. The tide of his feelings rose in its proper channel; he bent over her compassionately and raised her from the floor.

“Anne, Anne,” he said with returning fervor, “forgive me for my selfishness. I have been so blinded by the darkness that I thought I walked alone. And what is my misery compared with thine?”

He held her closely in his arms. It was not strange that a relaxation of mind should follow with the knowledge that she was not standing wholly alone. With her realisation that his past indifference had been but a temporary condition, her emotions became too strong to control, and the flood of tears that welled from her eyes gave evidence of the recent strain to which her feelings had been subjected. He did not attempt to subdue this exhibition of sensitiveness except with words of hope and assurance of his love, while he continued to hold her to him. The emotion had at length spent its force, and a calmness that seemed unnatural in the presence of the dead pervaded her. Releasing herself from his embrace she went over and kneeled down beside the body of Frazer. She touched the face compassionately, at the same time shocked with the sense that life was wholly extinct. The face was turned back so that the wound was on the side toward the floor. Half of the horribleness of the object was thus hidden, and viewing the profile she was again struck with its likeness to Marlowe’s.