'There is nothing to tell, Leda!'
'Oh, but how can you be so _cluel_ to me?' she cries, and ah, there was
anguish in that voice! 'There is something to tell--there _is!_ Don't I
know it vely well by your voice?'
Ah, the thought took me then, how, on the morrow, she would ring, and
have no answer; and she would ring again, and have no answer; and she
would ring all day, and ring, and ring; and for ever she would ring,
with white-flowing hair and the staring eye-balls of frenzy, battering
reproaches at the doors of God, and the Universe would cry back to her
howls and ravings only one eternal answer of Silence, of Silence. And as
I thought of that--for very pity, for very pity, my God--I could not
help sobbing aloud:
'May God pity you, woman!'
I do not know if she heard it: she _must_, I think, have heard: but no
reply came; and there I, shivering like the sheeted dead, stood waiting
for her next word, waiting long, dreading, hoping for, her voice,
thinking that if she spoke and sobbed but once, I should drop dead,
dead, where I stood, or bite my tongue through, or shriek the high laugh
of distraction.
Pages:
463
464
465
466
467
468
469
470
471
472
473
474
475
476
477
478
479
480
481
482
483
484
485
486
487