Book II
30. Chapter XXX.
(continued)
He pulled the sash down and turned back. "Catch
my death!" he echoed; and he felt like adding: "But
I've caught it already. I AM dead--I've been dead for
months and months."
And suddenly the play of the word flashed up a wild
suggestion. What if it were SHE who was dead! If she
were going to die--to die soon--and leave him free!
The sensation of standing there, in that warm familiar
room, and looking at her, and wishing her dead, was
so strange, so fascinating and overmastering, that its
enormity did not immediately strike him. He simply
felt that chance had given him a new possibility to
which his sick soul might cling. Yes, May might die--
people did: young people, healthy people like herself:
she might die, and set him suddenly free.
She glanced up, and he saw by her widening eyes
that there must be something strange in his own.
"Newland! Are you ill?"
He shook his head and turned toward his arm-chair.
She bent over her work-frame, and as he passed he laid
his hand on her hair. "Poor May!" he said.
"Poor? Why poor?" she echoed with a strained laugh.
"Because I shall never be able to open a window
without worrying you," he rejoined, laughing also.
For a moment she was silent; then she said very low,
her head bowed over her work: "I shall never worry if
you're happy."
"Ah, my dear; and I shall never be happy unless I
can open the windows!"
"In THIS weather?" she remonstrated; and with a sigh
he buried his head in his book.
Six or seven days passed. Archer heard nothing from
Madame Olenska, and became aware that her name
would not be mentioned in his presence by any member
of the family. He did not try to see her; to do so
while she was at old Catherine's guarded bedside would
have been almost impossible. In the uncertainty of the
situation he let himself drift, conscious, somewhere
below the surface of his thoughts, of a resolve which
had come to him when he had leaned out from his
library window into the icy night. The strength of that
resolve made it easy to wait and make no sign.
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