CHAPTER XXI
CONCLUSION
Lola stood there, leaning against the partly-opened door, looking atthem, with a smile of curious amusement on her face. Maria, after onelong look, sank to her knees and hid her face in her arms. John andthe Doctor stood silent, both of them trying to find in this pale,wonderfully gowned, hollow-eyed but beautiful woman some trace of thegirl they had loved. It was Lola--and yet----
"Ah!" She spoke quietly, but with a queer monotony of tone that struckunpleasantly on the ear. "All my old friends. I hardly expected this."
"You have come back."
"Yes, John, as you so keenly observe, I have come back."
"To stay?"
"For the present, yes."
"I knew that you would come."
"Oh, yes, no doubt. You looked for me to return in rags andrepentance. That naturally would be your idea of a proper retribution.Well, I am here, but I came in neither rags nor repentance. I do noteven come in fear. I came to claim what is mine by right." She steppedforward very slowly and sat in the same little chair she had alwayschosen. John noticed how languid were all her movements; the Doctorsaw more, and knew now the reason of her return. He would have spoken,but he heard her father's step in the hall, and for one of the fewtimes in his life he lost his head. He tried to call out, to warn him,in some way to prepare him for the shock, but he could not; he seemedfor a moment to have lost the power of speech, of movement, and beforehe could recover himself Dr. Barnhelm came into the room.
"I could not sleep, Paul," he began; "I tried, but----" Then he sawher. She sat in the chair looking at him with no trace of softening onher face, no shame, just a half smile of amusement. Maria rose fromher knees and stepped toward him, her arms held out as if to offer himprotection. The two men stepped forward, watching his face for thesign of love and forgiveness they both hoped to see there. It did notcome. He paused for just a moment, then spoke very quietly, withextreme politeness.
"I had not expected you--quite yet."
"No?" She seemed quite as calm, quite as formal as he was himself.
"You are to remain with us?" He asked the question as one might ask itof a perfect stranger.
"Yes."
"Your room is ready, I believe. Maria."
"Yes, sir." Maria stepped to his side.
"You will see to everything, Maria."
"Yes, sir."
"Martin!" Dr. Crossett could contain himself no longer. "Is this theway you meet, you two?"
"Why not?" Lola looked up at him coldly. "We understand one anotherquite well, I think."
"I think so," replied her father, "but I must be sure. I must speakwith you alone."
"Come, John. Come, Maria." Dr. Crossett went with them to the door,but the sight of those two, father and daughter, coldly facing oneanother, was more than he could bear, and he returned to Dr. Barnhelmand, putting both hands on his shoulders, spoke to him with all histenderness, all his love for them, and for the dead mother to whomthis sight would have been so terrible, in his voice.
"Martin, if our old friendship means anything to you, I beg you toremember that she has come back to us, not for blame or reproaches,but for comfort, for love!"
"I must speak to her alone." Dr. Barnhelm's voice was so firm, hismanner so full of an iron resolution, that Dr. Crossett could say nomore. He turned to Lola with a pitiful attempt at his old lightness ofmanner, and without again looking back he left the room, only pausingto shut the door behind him.
She did not speak, but sat there, never for a moment taking her eyesfrom his face and waiting; at last he began.
"Why are you here?"
"I am here because they tell me that I am going to die."
He had not expected this, and for a moment it broke through the sternrepose of his manner.
"What?"
"So they say," she answered calmly, "the best of them. There issomething here." She put her hand to her side.
"Your heart."
"Did you think," she said, her whole face lighting up with a flash ofmerriment, "that it was my soul?" She laughed then, quite with her oldhearty laugh, at his cry of horror and at his look of mortal agony ashe shrank away from her, his arms thrown up, as if to ward off somedeadly peril. "They told me," she continued, "that it was not aquestion of months or of years, but of hours, and so I came to you."
"Why?"
"Because you are the one man in all the world who can help me. You cankeep me from death, or if I die you can do the thing you did before!"She made the first movement she had made since she had sunk into herchair as she raised her hand and pointed to the gleaming brass, thebright glass, and the coiled wires of his apparatus, which stood thereon the table.
He had known always that this moment was to come to him, had knownwhat his answer was to be, and he shook his head in refusal.
"You must! That you must swear. I cannot die! Not now! You know that!You must not let me die! You owe me that, at least!"
She had lost her composure, her breath came in fitful, uneven gasps,and as she sat there she pressed one hand over her heart.
"Wait!" He spoke quickly. "You must answer me some questions."
"Well."
"You, my daughter, your mother's daughter, left my house with amarried man?"
"Yes."
"You robbed me; you were willing that a good, loyal girl, whoworshipped you, should suffer in your place. You broke the heart of ayoung man who loved you?"
"Yes. I did those things."
"Do you feel sorrow for them?"
"No."
"Do you feel shame for what you did then or for all the things youhave done since then?"
"No!"
"You did them because they suited your mood? What you wanted you took;the thing you felt that you wanted to do you did?"
"Yes."
"Without a regret? Without one single backward thought of us?"
"Why should I think of you?" she asked scornfully. "What did you meanin my life, any of you, after I once put you all behind me? Does onethink again of the food that nourished him yesterday, or of the sunthat kept him warm? I was born into this world like any other thingthat breathes, to live if I was strong, to die if I was weak. I didnot ask for life, but when it came, why should I not get all of itsbrightness if I could? Why should I think of anyone's pleasures orpains but my own? What is the world to me but the place in which I amto live my own life, in my own way, and for my own good?"
"You need not go on," he said quietly. "You have told me all that Iwished to know."
"But you have not given me the promise I came here to get." As shespoke she rose unsteadily from her chair, clinging for support to theback of it and looking at him with a fierce questioning in her eyes."Will you stay by me until my heart fails?"
"I will."
"Will you do your best to save me?"
"I will."
"And if you fail?" At her question her voice rose shrilly, almost to ascream. "If I die, as they said that I must--what will you do then?Answer! Answer! Will you bring my life back to me? Will you?"
He would not answer; for a moment she looked at him, her face frozeninto lines of awful terror; then screaming, panting, she staggered tothe door, and opening it she called wildly:
"John! Doctor! Come! Come!"
They rushed in, Maria following, and would have gone to her, but shewaved them back and pointed at her father, her face dreadful with itslook of fear and hatred. "Listen! You--you must help me. You must makethat man swear what I want him to swear, and you must see that hekeeps his word! He must! He won't if he can help it. I know he won't.Look at him! Look at his face. What do you read there? Pity? Love?Sympathy? Sympathy for me? Do you? No! Fear! He is afraid that I willmake him swear, and I will--I will----!"
She rushed at him, staggered forward as though she would tear thepromise from him, but as they cried out and threw themselves between,she stopped suddenly and, throwing up her arms, screamed once and fellat their feet. Dr. Crossett knelt beside her an
d in a moment looked upgravely.
"No pulse! Her heart does not beat. Quick, Martin!" He left her andsprang to the table, seeking frantically for the electric switch thatwould start the machine.
"No!" The father's voice came quietly, but his eyes never left thefigure that lay motionless on the floor.
"What!" John cried out in amazement.
"You must!" Paul Crossett put his hand out and shook the old manalmost roughly. "You must! She is your daughter!"
"She is not my daughter. My daughter died ten months ago. Mydaughter's soul is with her mother's, as pure and as white as on theday I first held her in my arms. I owe no duty to this creature here.This empty shell from which the soul has been driven out. I am not herfather, but if I were, I still would say--in God's name--let her die!"
He had taken a heavy mallet in his hand, and as he spoke he brought itdown with all his strength upon the delicate mechanism in front ofhim. He struck twice, and there was nothing left but a mass of brokenglass and a heap of bent and twisted wires.
THE END