"I cannot but say it; it is the truth. You have saved me from a degradation such as you could not understand. Great God! how should I feel to-day if you had not come forward to save me?"
He walked away from her. He stood with his back turned to her, looking out of the window.
She remained where he had left her. She did not speak. Why should she speak?
He suddenly faced her once again. The expression upon his face astonished her. She had never before seen a man so completely in the power of a strong emotion. She saw him making the attempt to speak, but not succeeding for some time. Her heart was full of pity for him.
"You--you cannot understand," he managed to say. "You cannot understand, and I cannot, I dare not, try to explain anything of the peril from which you snatched me. You know nothing of the baseness, the cruelty, of a man who allows himself to be swayed by his own passions. But you saved me--you saved me!"
"I thank God for that," she said slowly. "But you must not come to me to ask me for my love. It is not to me you should come. It is for her who was ready to sacrifice everything for you. You must go to her when the time comes, not now--she has not recovered from her shock."
"You know--she has told you?"
"I knew all that terrible story--that pitiful story--before I heard it from her lips."
"And yet--yet--you could speak to me--you could be with me day after day?"
"Oh, I know what you would say! You would say that I led you on--that I gave you to believe that I loved you. That is what you would say, and it would be the truth. I made up my mind to lead you on; I gave you to understand that I cared for you. But I confess to you now that I did so because I hoped to save her. You see it was a plot on my part --the plot of one woman anxious to save her sister from destruction. I succeeded. Thank God for that--thank God for that!"
"You succeeded--you succeeded indeed." He spoke slowly and in a low tone, his eyes fixed upon her burning face. "Yes, you led me on--you led me from earth to heaven. You saved her--you saved me. That is why I am here to-day."
"Oh, it is not here you should be, Mr. Courtland." She had turned quickly away from him with a gesture of impatience and had walked to the other end of the room. There was more than a suspicion of indignation in her voice. "You should be with the woman whom you loved; the woman who showed you how she loved you; the woman who was ready to give up everything--honor--husband--God--for you. Go to her--to her--when the numbness has passed away from her, and there is no barrier between you and her. That is all I have to say to you, Mr. Courtland."
"Is it indeed all, Phyllis?" he said. "But you will let me speak to you. You will let me ask if Ella alone was ready to sacrifice herself?
You say that you led me to love you in order to save her. How did you lead me on? By giving me to understand that you were not indifferent to me--that you had some love for me. Let me ask you if you were acting a lie at that time?"
"I wanted to save her."
"And you succeeded. Were you acting a lie?"
She was silent.
"You were willing to save her?" he continued. "How did you mean to save her? Were you prepared to go to the length of marrying me when I had been led on to that point by you? Answer me, Phyllis."
"I will not answer you, Mr. Courtland--you have no right to ask me to answer you. One terrible moment had changed all the conditions under which we were living. If she had been free,--as she is now,--do you fancy for a moment that I should have come between you--that I should have tried to lead you away from her? Well, then, surely you must see as clearly as I do at the present moment that now our relative positions are the same as they would have been some months ago, if Ella had been free--if she could have loved you without being guilty of a crime? Oh, Mr. Courtland do not ask me to humiliate myself further. Please go away. Ah, cannot you see that it would be impossible for me to act now as I might have acted before? Cannot you see that I am not a woman who would be ready to steal happiness for myself from my dearest friend?"
"I think I am beginning to see what sort of woman you are--what sort of a being a woman may be. You love me, Phyllis, and yet you will send me away from you lest you should do Ella a wrong?"
"I implore of you to go away from me, because if Ella had been free a month ago as she is to-day, she would have married you."
"But she fancied that she loved me a month ago. She knows that she does not love me now. You love me--you, Phyllis, my love, my beloved; you dare not say that when you led me to love you, you were not led unthinkingly to love me yourself. Will you deny that, my darling?"
He had strode passionately up to her, and before she could resist he had put his arms about her and was kissing her on the face. For a moment only she resisted, then she submitted to his kisses.
"You are mine--mine--mine!" he whispered, and she knew that she was.
She now knew how to account for the brilliant successes of the man in places where every other civilized man had perished. He was a master of men. "You love me, darling, and I love you. What shall separate us?"
With a little cry she freed herself.
"You have said the truth!" she cried; "the bitter truth. I love you! I love you! I love you! You are my love, my darling, my king forever.
But I tell you to go from me. I tell you that I shall never steal from any sister what is hers by right. I would have sacrificed myself--I did not love you then--to keep you from her; I am now ready to sacrifice myself--now that I love you--to give you to her. Ah, my love, my own dear love, you know me, and you know that I should hate myself--that I should hate you, too, if I were to marry you, now that she is free. Go, my beloved--go!"
He looked at her face made beautiful with tears. "Let me plead with you, Phyllis. Let me say--"
"Oh, go! go! go!"
He put out his hand to her.
