And of this last meeting, Lorimer, I gather, is always restlessly
expectant, his whole life concentrated, as it were, in a very passion of
waiting for a moment which will surely come. His theory, I confess, escapes
me, nor can I guess how far a certain feverish remorse, an intention of
expiation may be set as a guiding spring in his unhinged mind, and account,
at least in part, for the fantastic attitude which he must have adopted for
many years. If I cannot forgive him, at least I bear him no malice, and
for the rest, our paths will hardly cross again. One takes up one's life
and expiates its errors, each after one's several fashion--and my way is
not Lorimer's. And now that it is all so clear, there is nothing to keep
me here any longer, nothing to bring me back again. For it seemed to me
to-day, strangely enough, as though a certain candle of hope, of promise,
of pleasant possibilities, which had flickered with more or less light for
so many years, had suddenly gone out and left me alone in utter darkness,
as the knowledge was borne in upon me that henceforth Madame de Savaresse
had passed altogether and finally out of my life.
And so to-morrow--Brussels!
A CASE OF CONSCIENCE
I
It was in Brittany, and the apples were already acquiring a ruddier,
autumnal tint, amid their greens and yellows, though Autumn was not yet;
and the country lay very still and fair in the sunset which had befallen,
softly and suddenly as is the fashion there.
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