He did not look towards her. "Paul!" she whispered
entreatingly; and although so low there was the utmost anguish in the
tone: "Paul." As though not knowing what she did, she raised her arm,
standing behind him there, as if to shake hands. Abruptly he wheeled
round, with a face down which the great tears coursed, but awful in its
pallor and sternness; and, taking no notice of her outstretched hand,
pointed to the door. Weeping bitterly, she swiftly turned and went.
I cannot describe the shock this terrible scene gave me. It did not take
half-a-dozen short moments to enact, but it represented, unmistakably,
the blasting of two lives--the lives of those dearest in all the world
to me.
I do not know, I never knew, whether Paul saw me. I think I must have
become momentarily unconscious, and when I came to myself he was gone.
I sat where I was, weeping bitter tears--bitter as Janet's--and thought
of the little lassie in the dirty pink frock that had sung and swung
about the stairs, and of the boy who had stood day-dreaming, looking up
into the blue sky. Sometimes I was wildly angry. Whose fault was it? Who
was answerable for this? If it was the young people's own fault, someone
ought to have looked after them better, ought to have prevented it. No
one, not even I, could help them now, that was the bitterest, bitterest
part of it; no one and nothing--save time, or death.
I wished that day I had never left my children.
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