_ PART III CHAPTER VII. THE NET
It was not often that Sylvia lay awake, but that night her brain was in a turmoil, and for long she courted sleep in vain. For some time after she retired, the murmur of Burke's and Kelly's voices in the adjoining room kept her on the alert, but it was mainly the thoughts that crowded in upon her that would not let her rest. The thought of Guy troubled her most, this and the knowledge that Kieff was in the neighbourhood. She had an almost uncanny dread of this man. He seemed to stand in the path as a menace, an evil influence that she could neither avert nor withstand. Burke had barely mentioned him, yet his words had expressed the thought that had sprung instantly to her mind. He was an enemy to them all, most of all to Guy, and she feared him. She had a feeling that she would sooner or later have to fight him for Guy's soul, and she was sick with apprehension. For the only weapon at her disposal was that weapon she dare not wield.
The long night dragged away. She thought it would never end. When sleep came to her at last it was only to bring dreadful dreams in its train. Burke in danger! Burke imprisoned in a burning hut! Burke at the mercy of Kieff, the merciless!
She wrenched herself free from these nightmares in the very early morning while the stars were still in the sky, and went out on to the _stoep_ to banish the evil illusions from her brain. It was still and cold and desolate. The guest-hut in which Kelly was sleeping was closed. There was no sign of life anywhere. A great longing to go out alone on to the _veldt_ came to her. She felt as if the great solitude must soothe her spirit. And it would be good to realize her wish and to see the day break from that favourite _kopje_ of hers.
She turned to re-enter her room for an extra wrap, and then started at sight of another figure standing at the corner of the bungalow. She thought it was Burke, and her heart gave a wild leap within her, but the next moment as it began to move noiselessly towards her, she recognized Guy.
He came to her on stealthy feet. "Hullo!" he whispered. "Can't you sleep?"
She held out her hand to him. "Guy! You ought to be in bed!"
He made an odd grimace, and bending, carried her hand to his lips. "I couldn't sleep either. I've been tormented with a fiery thirst all night long. What has been keeping you awake? Honestly now!"
He laughed into her eyes, and she was aware that he was trying to draw her nearer to him. There was about him at, that moment a subtle allurement that was hard to resist. Old memories thrilled through her at his touch. For five years she had held herself as belonging to him. Could the spell be broken in as many months?
Yet she did resist him, turning her face away. "I can't tell you," she said, a quiver in her voice. "I had a good deal to think about. Guy, what is--Kieff doing at Piet Vreiboom's?"
Guy frowned. "Heaven knows. He is there for his own amusement, not mine."
"You didn't know he was there?" she said, looking at him again.
His frown deepened. "Yes, I knew. Of course I knew. Why?"
Her heart sank. "I don't like him," she said. "I know he is clever. I know he saved your life. But I never did like him. I--am afraid of him."
"Perhaps you would have rather he hadn't saved my life?" suggested Guy, with a twist of the lips. "It would have simplified matters considerably, wouldn't it?"
"Don't!" she said, and withdrew her hand. "You know how it hurts me--to hear you talk like that."
"Why should it hurt you?" said Guy.
She was silent, and he did not press for an answer. Instead, very softly he whistled the air of a song that he had been wont to sing to her half in jest in the old days.
Love that hath us in the net
Can he pass and we forget?
She made a little movement of flinching, but the next moment she turned back to him with absolute steadfastness. "Guy, you and I are friends, aren't we? We never could be anything else."
"Oh, couldn't we?" said Guy.
"No," she maintained resolutely. "Please let us remember that! Please let us build on that!"
He looked at her whimsically. "It's a shaky foundation," he said. "But we'll try. That is, we'll pretend if you like. Who knows? We may succeed."
"Don't put it like that!" she said. "Be a man, Guy! I know you can be. Only yesterday----"
"Yesterday? What happened yesterday?" said Guy. "I never remember the yesterdays."
"I think you do," she said. "You did a big thing yesterday. You saved Burke."
"Oh, that!" He uttered a low laugh. "My dear girl, don't canonize me on that account! I only did it because those swine wanted to see him burn."
She shuddered. "That is not true. You know it is not true. It pleases you to pretend you are callous. But you are not at heart. Burke knows that as well as I do,"
"Oh, damn Burke!" he said airly. "He's no great oracle. I wonder what you'd have said if I had come back without him."
She clenched her hands hard to keep back another shudder. "I can't talk of that--can't think of it even. You don't know--you will never realize--all that Burke has done for me."
"Yes, I do know," Guy said. "But most men would have jumped at the chance to do the same. You take it all too seriously. It was no sacrifice to him. You don't owe him anything. He wouldn't have done it if he hadn't taken a fancy to you. And he didn't do it for nothing either. He's not such a philanthropist as that."
Somehow that hurt her intolerably. She looked at him with a quick flash of anger in her eyes. "Do you want to make me hate you?" she said.
He turned instantly and with a most winning gesture. "No, darling. You couldn't if you tried," he said.
She went back a step, shaking her head. "I am not so sure," she said. "Why do you say these horrible things to me?"
He held out his hand to her. "I'm awfully sorry, dear," he said. "But it is for your good. I want you to see life as it is, not as your dear little imagination is pleased to paint it. You are so dreadfully serious always. Life isn't, you know. It really isn't. It's nothing but a stupid and rather vulgar farce."
She gave him her hand, for she could not deny him; but she gave no sign of yielding with it. "Oh, how I wish you would take it more seriously!" she said.
"Do you?" he said. "But what's the good? Who Is it going to benefit if I do? Not myself. I should hate it. And not you. You are much too virtuous to have any use for me."
"Oh, Guy," she said, "Is it never worth while to play the game?"
His hand tightened upon hers. "Look here!" he said suddenly. "Suppose I did as you wish--suppose I did pull up--play the game, as you call it? Suppose I clawed and grabbed for success Like the rest of the world--and got it. Would you care?"
"I wasn't talking of success," she said. "That's no answer." He swung her hand to and fro with vehement impatience. "Suppose you were free--yes, you've got to suppose it just for a moment--suppose you were free--and suppose I came to you with both hands full, and offered you myself and all I possessed--would you send me empty away? Would you? Would you?"
He spoke with a fevered insistence. His eyes were alight and eager. Just so had he spoken in the long ago when she had given him her girlish heart in full and happy surrender.
There was no surrender in her attitude now, but yet she could not, she could not, relentlessly send him from her. He appealed so strongly, with so intense an earnestness.
"I can't imagine these things, Guy," she said at last. "I only ask you--implore you--to do your best to keep straight. It is worth while, believe me. You will find that it is worth while."
"It might be--with you to make it so," he said. "Without you----"
She shook her head. "No--no! For other, better reasons. We have our duty to do. We must do it. It is the only way to be happy. I am sure of that."
"Have you found it so?" he said. "Are you happy?"
She hesitated.
He pressed his advantage instantly. "You are not. You know you are not. Do you think you can deceive me even though you may deceive yourself? We have known each other too long for that. You are not happy, Sylvia. You are afraid of life as it is--of life as it might be. You haven't pluck to take your fate into your own hands and hew out a way for yourself. You're the slave of circumstances and you're afraid to break free." He made as if he would release her, and then suddenly, unexpectedly, caught her hand up to his face. "All the same, you are mine--you are mine!" he told her hotly. "You belonged to me from the beginning, and nothing else counts or ever can count against that. I would have died to get out of your way. I tried to die. But you brought me back. And now, say what you like--say what you like--you are mine! I saw it in your eyes last night, and I defy every law that man ever made to take you from me. I defy the thing you call duty. You love me! You have always loved me! Deny it if you can!"
It was swift, it was almost overwhelming. At another moment it might have swept her off her feet. But a greater force was at work within her, and she stood her ground.
She drew her hand away. "Not like that, Guy," she said. "I love you. Yes, I love you. But only as a friend. You--you don't understand me. How should you? I have grown beyond all your knowledge of me. I was a girl in the old days--when we played at love together." A sharp sob rose in her throat, but she stifled it. "All that is over. I am a woman now. My eyes are open,--and--the romance is all gone."
He stiffened as if he had been struck, but only for a second. The next recklessly he laughed. "That is just your way of putting it," he said. "Love doesn't change--like that. It either goes out, or it remains--for good. It is you who don't understand yourself. You may turn your back on the truth, but you can't alter it. Those who have once been lovers--and lovers such as you and I--can never again be only friends. That, if you like, is the impossible. But--" He paused for a moment, with lifted shoulders, then abruptly turned to go. "Good-bye!" he said.
"You are going?" she questioned.
He swung on his heel as if irresolute. "Yes, I am going. I am going back to my cabin, back to my wallowing in the mire. Why not? Is there anyone who cares the toss of a halfpenny what I do?"
"Yes." Breathlessly she answered him; the words seemed to leap from her of their own accord, and surely it was hardly of her own volition that she followed and held his arm, detaining him. "Guy! You know we care. Burke cares. I care. Guy, please, dear, please! It's such a pity. Oh, it's such a pity! Won't you--can't you--fight against it? Won't you even--try? I know you could conquer, if only--if only you would try!" Her eyes were raised to his. She besought him with all the strength of her being. She clung to him as if she would hold him back by sheer physical force from the abyss at his feet. "Oh, Guy, it is worth while!" she pleaded. "Indeed--indeed it is worth while--whatever it costs. Guy,--I beseech--I implore you----"
She broke off, for with a lightning movement he had taken her face between his hands. "You can make it worth while," he said. "I will do it--for you."
He held her passionately close for an instant, but he did not kiss her. She saw the impulse to do so in his eyes, and she saw him beat it fiercely back. That was the only comfort that remained to her when the next moment he sprang away and went so swiftly from her that he was lost to sight almost before she knew that he was gone. _