yes. He laid them on the table. "Take them," he said.
"No," she shuddered. "I could never forget that once they were both black." She flung them into the fender. "Oh John," she cried, turning to him and falling again to her knees, "I do so want to forget what I have been. I want to atone. You think you can drive me out of your life. You cannot, darling—since you won't kill me. Always I shall follow you on my knees, thus."
He looked down at her over his folded arms,
"I am not going to back out of my promise," he repeated.
She stopped her ears.
With a stern joy he unfolded his arms, took some papers from his breast-pocket, and, selecting one of them, handed it to her. It was the telegram sent by his steward.
She read it. With a stern joy he watched her reading it.
Wild-eyed, she looked up from it to him, tried to speak, and swerved down senseless.
He had not foreseen this. "Help!" he vaguely cried—was she not a fellow-creature?—and rushed blindly out to his bedroom, whence he returned, a moment later, with the water-jug. He dipped his hand, and sprinkled the upturned face (Dew-drops on a white rose? But some other, sharper analogy hovered to him). He dipped and sprinkled. The water-beads broke, mingled—rivulet
