CHAPTER XLIV.
"WHY DO YOU CRY FOR ME?"
When he said that he had seen Murdoch standing in the road before the house, he had spoken the truth. It was also true that even as they stood upon the terrace he was there still.
He was there every night. Where he slept or when, or if at all, his mother and Christian did not know; they only knew that he never spent a night at home. They barely saw him from day to day. When he came home in the morning and evening, it was to sit at the table, rarely speaking, scarcely tasting food, only drinking greedily the cup of strong coffee Christian always had in readiness for him. The girl was very good to him in these days. She watched him in terror of his unnatural mood. He hardly seemed to see them when they were in the room with him; his eyes were hollow and burning bright; he grew thin and narrow-chested and stooped; his hands were unsteady when he lifted anything.
When she was alone, Christian said to herself again and again:
"He will die. There is no help for it. He will die—or worse."
One morning she came down to find him lying on the sofa with closed eyes and such a deathly face that she almost cried out aloud. But she restrained herself and went into the kitchen as if to perform her usual tasks. Not long afterward she returned carrying a little tray with a cup of hot coffee upon it.
"Will you drink this for me?" she said to him.
He opened his eyes a little impatiently, but he sat up and drank it.
"It's very good," he said, as he fell back again into his old position, "but you mustn't put yourself to trouble for me."
Afterward the coffee was always ready for him when he came in, and he got into the habit of drinking it mechanically.
The books he had been accustomed to pore over at every leisure moment lay unopened. He neither touched nor looked at them.
The two women tried to live their lives as if nothing were happening. They studiously avoided questioning or appearing to observe him.
"We must not let him think that we talk of him," Christian said.
She showed a wonderful gentleness and tact. Until long afterward, Mrs. Murdoch scarcely knew what support and comfort she had in her. Her past life had planted in her a readiness to despair.
"He is like his father," she said once. "He was like him as a child. He is very trusting and faithful, but when his belief is gone it is all over. He has given up as his father did before he died. He will not try to live."
He did not try to live, but he did not think of death. He was too full of other morbid thoughts. He could not follow any idea far. A thousand of them came and went, and in the end were as nothing.
"Why," he kept saying to himself weakly and wearily ,—"why was it? What had I done? It was a strange thing to choose me out of so many. I was hardly worth it. To have chosen another man would have served her better."
He did not know how the days passed at the Works. The men began to gaze at him askance and mutter when he went by.
"Th' feyther went daft," they said. "Is this chap goin' th' same way?"
It was only the look of his face which made them say so. He got through his work one way or another. But the days were his dread. The nights, strange and dreadful enough, were better than the broad daylight, with the scores of hands about him and the clangor of hammers and whir of machinery. He fell into the habit of going to the engine-room and standing staring at the engine, fascinated by it. Once he drew nearer and nearer with such a look in his eye that Floxham began to regard him stealthily. He went closer, pace by pace, and at last made a step which brought a shout from Floxham, who sprang upon him and tore him away.
"What art at, tha foo'?" he yelled. "Does tha want to go whoam on a shutter?"
Wakening, with a long breath, he said:
"I forgot, that was it. I was thinking of another thing."
The time came at length when he had altered so that when he went out his mother and Christian often sat up together half the night trembling with a fear neither of them would have put into words. As they sat trying to talk, each would glance at the other stealthily, and when their eyes met, each would start as if with some guilty thought.
On one of the worst and most dreadful of nights, Christian suddenly rose from her seat, crossed the hearth and threw herself upon her knees before her companion.
"I am going out," she said. "Don't—don't try to keep me."
"It is midnight," said Mrs. Murdoch, "and you don't know where to go."
"Yes," the girl returned, "I do. For God's sake, let me go! I cannot bear it."
The woman gave her a long look, and then said a strange and cruel thing.
"You had better stay where you are. It is not you he wants."
"No," she said bitterly, "it is not I he wants; but I can find him and make sure—that—he will come back. And then you will go to sleep." She left her in spite of her efforts to detain her. She was utterly fearless, and went into the night as if there was no such thing as peril on earth.
She did know where to go and went there. Murdoch was standing opposite the house in which Rachel Ffrench slept. She went to him and put her hand on his arm.
"What are you doing here?" she said, in a low voice. He turned and gave her a cold, vacant look. He did not seem at all surprised at finding her dark, beautiful young face at his very shoulder.
"I don't know. Can you tell me?"
"We have been waiting for you," she said. "We cannot rest when you are away."
"Do you want me to go home and go to bed decently and sleep?" he said. "Do you suppose I would not, if I could? I always start from here and come back here. I say to myself, 'It will take me an hour to reach the place where I can see her window.' It is something to hold one's mind in check with. This rambling—and—and forgetting what one has meant to think about is a terrible thing."
"Come home with me," she said. "We will not talk. You can lie on the sofa and we will go away. I want your mother to sleep."
Something in her presence began to influence him to a saner mood.
"What are you doing here?" he asked. "It is midnight."
"I am not afraid. I could not bear to stay in the house. We sit there——"
An idea seemed to strike him suddenly. He stopped her and asked deliberately:
"Did you come because you thought I might do myself harm?"
She would not answer, and after waiting a second or so he went on slowly:
"I have thought I might myself—sometimes, but never for long. You have no need to fear. I am always stopped by the thought that—perhaps—it is not worth it after all. When things look clearer, I shall get over it. Yes—I think I shall get over it—though now there seems to be no end. But—some day—it will come—and I shall get over it. Don't be afraid that I shall do myself harm. If I am not killed—before the end comes—I shall not kill myself. I shall know it was not worth it after all."
The tears had been running down her cheeks as she stood, but she bit her lip and forced herself to breathe evenly, so that he might not find her out. But just then, as he moved, a great drop fell upon the back of his hand. He stopped and began to tremble.
"Good heavens!" he cried. "You are crying. Why do you cry for me?"
"Because I cannot help it," she said in a half-whisper. "I do not cry often. I never cried for any one before."
"I'll take you home," he said, moving slowly along at her side. "Don't cry."