He pronounced those submissive words in a suddenly-lowered voice. Something in his tone, or something in the dropping of his eyes, set my heart beating quickly, with a certain vague expectation which I was unable to realize to myself.
"You agree with me," I said, "that you cannot be one amongst us at the rectory? What will you do?"
"I will remain at Browndown," he answered.
I felt he was lying. Don't ask for my reasons: I have no reasons to give. When he said "I will remain at Browndown," I felt he was lying.
"Why not do what Oscar asks of you?" I went on. "If you are absent, you may as well be in one place as in another. There is plenty of time still to leave Dimchurch."
He looked up as suddenly as he had looked down.
"Do you and Oscar think me a stock or a stone?" he burst out angrily.
"What do you mean?"
"Who are you indebted to for what is going to happen to-day?" he went on, more and more passionately. "You are indebted to Me. Who among you all stood alone in refusing to believe that she was blind for life? I did! Who brought the man here who has given her back her sight? I brought the man! And I am the one person who is to be left in ignorance of how it ends. The others are to be present: I am to be sent away. The others are to see it: I am to hear by post (if any of you think of writing to me) what she does, what she says, how she looks, at the first heavenly moment when she opens her eyes on the world." He flung up his hand in the air, and burst out savagely with a bitter laugh. "I astonish you, don't I? I am claiming a position which I have no right to occupy. What interest can I feel in it? Oh God! what do I care about the woman to whom I have given a new life?" His voice broke into a sob at those last wild words. He tore at the breast of his coat as if he was suffocating—and turned, and left me.
I stood rooted to the spot. In one breathless instant, the truth broke on me like a revelation. At last I had penetrated the terrible secret. Nugent loved her.