第53章

"Nonsense!" cried Dick. "Don't be a baby. Come in."

Together they entered and, laying aside her wrap, Iola sat down and drew forth Barney's letter.

"Listen, Dick. I want your advice." And she read over such portions of Barney's letter as she thought necessary.

"Well?" she said, as Dick remained silent.

"Well," replied Dick, "what's your answer to be?"

"You know what he means," said Iola a little impatiently. "He wants me to marry him at once and to settle down."

"Well," said Dick, "why not?"

"Now, Dick," cried Iola, "do you think I am suited for that kind of life? Can you picture me devoting myself to the keeping of a house tidy, the overseeing of meals? I fancy I see myself spending the long, quiet evenings, my husband busy in his office or out among his patients while I dose and yawn and grow fat and old and ugly, and the great world forgetting. Dick, I should die! Of course, I love Barney. But I must have life, movement. I can't be forgotten!"

"Forgotten?" cried Dick. "Why should you be forgotten? Barney's wife could not be ignored and the world could not forget you. And, after all," added Dick, in a musing tone, "to live with Barney ought to be good enough for any woman."

"Why, how eloquent you are, Dick!" she cried, making a little moue.

"You are quite irresistible!" she added, leaning toward him with a mocking laugh.

"Come, let us go," said Dick painfully, conscious of her physical charm. "We must get away."

"But you haven't helped me, Dick," she cried, drawing nearer to him and laying her hand upon his arm.

The perfume of her hair smote upon his senses. The beauty of her face and form intoxicated him.

He knew he was losing control of himself.

"Come, Iola," he said, "let us go."

"Tell me what to say, Dick," she replied, smiling into his face and leaning toward him.

"How can I tell you?" cried Dick desperately, springing up. "I only know you are beautiful, Iola, beautiful as an angel, as a devil! What has come over you, or is it me, that you should affect me so? Do you know," he added roughly, lifting her to her feet, his breath coming hard and fast, "I can hardly keep my hands off you. We must go. I must go. Come!"

"Poor child," mocked Iola, still smiling into his eyes, "is it afraid it will get hurt?"

"Stop it, Iola!" cried Dick. "Come on!"

"Come," she mocked, still leaning toward him.

Swiftly Dick turned, seized her in his arms, his eyes burning down upon her mocking face. "Kiss me!" he commanded.

Gradually she allowed the weight of her body to lean upon him, drawing him steadily down toward her the while, with the deep, passionate lure of her lustrous eyes.

"Kiss me!" he commanded again. But she shook her head, holding him still with her gaze.

"God in heaven!" cried Dick. "Go away!" He made to push her from him. She clasped him about the neck, allowing herself to sink in his arms with her face turned upward to his. Fiercely he crushed her to him, and again and again his hot, passionate kisses fell upon her face.

Conscious only of the passion throbbing in their hearts and pulsing through their bodies, oblivious to all about them, they heard not the opening of the door and knew not that a man had entered the room. For a single moment he stood stricken with horror as if gazing upon death itself. Turning to depart, his foot caught a chair. Terror-smitten, the two sprang apart and stood with guilt and shame stamped upon their ghastly faces.

"Barney!" they cried together.

Slowly he came back to them. "Yes, it is I." The words seemed to come from some far distance. "I couldn't wait. I came for my answer, Iola. I thought I could persuade you better. I have it now. I have lost you! And"--here he turned to Dick--"oh, my God!

My God! I have lost my brother, too!" he turned to depart from him.

"Barney," cried Dick passionately, "there was no wrong! There was nothing beyond what you saw!"

"Was that all?" inquired his brother quietly.

"As God is in heaven, Barney, that was all!"

Barney threw a swift glance round the room, crossed to a side table, and picked up a Bible lying there. He turned the leaves rapidly and handed it to his brother with his finger upon a verse.

"Read!" he said. "You know your Bible. Read!" His voice was terrible and compelling in its calmness.

Following the pointing finger, Dick's eyes fell upon words that seemed to sear his eyeballs as he read, "Whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his heart." Heart-smitten, Dick stood without a word.

"I could kill you now," said the quiet, terrible voice. "But what need? To me you are already dead."

When Dick looked up his brother had gone. Nerveless, broken, he sank into a chair and sat with his face in his hands. Beside him stood Iola, pale, rigid, her eyes distended as if she had seen a horrid vision. She was the first to recover.

"Dick," she said softly, laying her hand upon his head.

He sprang up as if her fingers had been red-hot iron and had burned to the bone.

"Don't touch me!" he cried in vehement frenzy. "You are a devil!

And I am in hell! In hell! do you hear?" He caught her by the arm and shook her. "And I deserve hell! Hell! Hell! Fools! no hell?" He turned again to her. "And for you, for this, and this, and this," touching her hair, her cheek, and her heaving bosom with his finger, "I have lost my brother--my brother--my own brother--Barney. Oh, fool that I am! Damned! Damned! Damned!"

She shrank back from him, then whispered with pale lips, "Oh, Dick, spare me! Take me home!"

"Yes, yes," he cried in mad haste, "anywhere, in the devil's name!

Come! Come!" He seized her wrap, threw it upon her shoulders, caught up his hat, tore open the door for her, and followed her out.

"Can a man take fire into his bosom and not be burned?" And out of the embers of his passion there kindled a fire that night that burned with unquenchable fury for many a day.