As soon as he had run sharply across the fields, John Huish subsided
into a walk, and going along at a pretty good pace, made straight for
his home.
To all appearances he was perfectly sane and in his right mind; but
there was only one dominant idea there, and to fulfil this he was
hurrying on. Still there was a certain amount of strange caution
developed in his acts. He seemed to know that there was something wrong
with him, and that he must be cautious how he spoke to people; and to
this end he carefully avoided everyone who appeared to take the
slightest notice of him, till he reached Westbourne Road. There he rang
the bell, and the door was answered by his domestic.
The servant looked at him strangely, but said nothing, and he hurried up
to his room to try and remove any traces that might strike a stranger of
his having been lately ill. His mind was clear enough for that, and as
he hastily bathed his face, the cold water refreshed him and he felt
more himself.
He was terribly confused, though, at times, and had to ask himself why
he was there.
That acted as a touchstone--Gertrude--he had come to seek his wife; he
had escaped so that he might find her, for the doctor would not let him
go. He told him--yes, he told him his wife was well, and he should see
her soon; but it was a lie to quiet him. That devil had got her--his
other self. Of course--the servant and the cabman told him so; but he
must be quiet, or they would stop him. Perhaps the doctor had sent
after him now.
He shuddered and gazed about him for a moment as if his mind were going
beyond his control. Then, mastering himself once more, he took up his
hat, opened the door, and passed out into the road.
Volume 3, Chapter XIII.
LORD HENRY RECEIVES A TELEGRAM.
"I shall be waiting for you this evening at the Channel Hotel. It is an
easy walk from the square. Ask to be shown to Number 99. If you are
not there by ten o'clock, good-bye! There will be the report of a
pistol heard. Without you I can bear my life no longer."
Every word burned into her mind, and she seemed to be mentally repeating
it constantly, even as some familiar tune will keep on humming in the
brain.
"If you are not there by ten o'clock there will be the report of a
pistol heard."
Marie felt that he would keep his word.
Over and over and over again, with dreary reiteration, those words kept
recurring, and then, as the day wore on and she went to her room, she
found herself repeating them aloud.
She bathed her burning temples, but found no relief. She threw herself
upon a couch, and tried to obtain rest, but those words kept on, and she
repeated them as if they were a lesson, till everything seemed dreamlike
and strange, and she wondered whether she had really met Glen that
morning.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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