CHAPTER x.x.xVIII

When Rush and Mrs. Balfame reached the jail sitting-room she mechanically removed her heavy hat and veil and sank into a chair.

"Is it true that Anna is dead?"

Her voice was as toneless as the district attorney's had been.

"Yes--and we can only be grateful."

"And she did that for me--for _me_. How strange! How very, very strange!"

"It has been done before in the history of the world." Rush too was very tired.

"But a woman--"

"I fancy you were the romance of poor Anna's life. She indulged in no dreams of the usual sort, with her plain face and squat figure. No doubt she had centred all her romantic yearnings and all her maternal cravings on you. She thought you perfect--unequalled--"

"I! I!"

She sprang to her feet and thrust her head forward, her eyes coming to life with resentment and wonder.

"What--_what_ am I that two people--two people like you and Anna Steuer--should be ready to die for me? Why, I have never thought of a mortal being but myself! Anna must have been born with dotage in her brain. She knew me all my life. She saw me organise charities, give to the poor what I could afford, find work for the deserving now and again, and she heard me read absurd compositions before the Friday Club upon the duty of Women to Society; but she must have known that all were mere details in my scheme of life and that I was the most selfish creature that ever breathed."

Rush shrugged his shoulders, although he was watching her with a quickened interest. "Why try to a.n.a.lyse? The gift to inspire devotion--fascination--is as determinate as the gift to write a poem or compose a symphony. It has existed in some of the worst men and women that have ever lived. You are not that--not by a long sight--"

"Oh, no! I am not one of the worst women that have ever lived. Do you know what I am, how I see myself to-night? I am merely a commonplace woman everlastingly anxious to do the 'right thing.' That is the beginning and the end of me, with the exception of a brief aberration--a release under stress of those anti-social instincts that are deep in every mortal and exhibited by every child that ever lived. Oh, I am one of civilisation's proudest products, for I never had the slightest difficulty with those inherited impulses before. Nor will they ever rise again. I've even 'improved' during my long hours of solitude in this room, but it's all of a piece. I've not changed. We none of us do that.

I shall live and die a commonplace woman trying to do the 'right thing.'"

"Oh--let us go now. You must rest. You are very tired."

"I was. But it has pa.s.sed. The shock of Anna's statement and death brought me up standing. I shall sail for Europe to-morrow, if there is a boat. It was Anna's constant regret that she could not go to the battlefields and nurse, but she would not leave those that depended upon her here. In some small measure I can take her place. They give a first course in London I am told. And I am strong, very strong."

She paused abruptly and moved forward and took his hand.

"Good night and good-bye," she said. "I shall sleep here to-night. And please understand that you are free."

"What do you mean?" Rush's face set like a mask, but the colour mounted.

The grip of his hand was merely nervous, and when she withdrew hers his unconsciously went to his hip and steadied itself.

"I mean that so far as lies in my power I shall harm no one again as long as I live. Moreover, I have seen how it was with you for some time, although I would not admit it, for I intended to marry you. Perhaps I should have done so if it had not been for Anna. It took that to lift me quite out of myself and enable me to see myself and all things relating to me in their true proportions--for once. It is my moment--If I am ever to have one. You no longer love me, and if you did I should not marry you. I say nothing of the injustice to yourself--I could not take the risk of disillusioning you." She laughed a little nervously. "I fancy I have done that already. But it does not matter. Go and marry some girl near your own age who will be a companion, not an ideal with heart and brain as well as feet of clay."

"You are excited," said Rush brusquely, although his heart was hammering, and singing youth poured through his veins. "I shall leave you now--"

"You will say good-bye to me now, and that is the last word. I'll telephone my plans to c.u.mmack in the morning. There is no reason for us to meet again. To me you will always be a very wonderful and beautiful memory, for it is something--be sure I appreciate just what it does mean--to have embodied a romantic illusion if only for an hour. Now good-bye once more; and find your real happiness as quickly as you can."

She had opened the door. She pushed him gently out into the corridor, closed the door and locked it. Mrs. Balfame was alone with the crushing burden of her soul.