"
"Then what in hell are you crying about?"
"Because I'm not--not a damned adulterer!" the words were torn from her.
"But I can't clean my thoughts of wanting to be. My dear--after so
long--I've helped you and been patient. Can't you do something--now, to
make me able to bear it?"
"Now _you_ know what it is to--" he began with an ugly laugh. Then rage
seized him. "I'll break his damned neck," he cried.
"That's no use! What will that do to me? You can't kill the love that's
tearing me up, by smashing his body to bits! You see, Louis, I've got
him, for ever and ever. The shining, knightly side of me has. But it's
the greedy side of me--the side that makes you grab out for
whisky--that's sticking teeth into me now. And you know how it hurts."
"God! I'll break his damned neck," he cried again, and raged off into
the Bush.
She crept into the house. A wild thought came to her that, if there were
any killing it would be Kraill who would do it. And he and she would run
away for awhile, right into the Bush, before people came to hang them.
She stopped breathing at the gloriousness, the primitive
full-bloodedness of it, and then writhed in horror at the greed of such
thoughts, and prayed passionately that a sentry might be put at the door
of her mind.
And she knew, very well, that presently Louis would be back--that he
would say once again all the foul things he had said before, now with
some glimmering of truth in them: that he would get money from somewhere
and be drunk to-night, for now, at least, he had excuse.
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