_ CHAPTER TWELVE. GUEST PAYS A LATE VISIT
The crystals had dissolved in the glass as Stratton held it up and gazed fixedly at its contents, his face, stern and calm, dimly seen in the shadow, while the shape of the vessel he grasped was plainly delineated against the white blotting paper, upon which a circle of bright light was cast by the shaded lamp.
He was not hesitating, but thinking calmly enough. The paroxysm of horror had been mastered, and as a step was faintly heard crossing the court, he was trying to think out whether there was anything else which he ought to do before that cold hand gripped him and it would be too late.
He looked round, set down the glass for a moment by his letters, and thrusting aside the library chair he used at his writing table, he wheeled forward a lounge seat ready to receive him as he sank back, thinking quietly that the action of the terrible acid would perhaps be very sudden.
Anything more?
He smiled pleasantly, for a fresh thought flashed across his mind, and taking an envelope he bent down and directed it plainly, and without the slightest trembling of his hand, to Mrs Brade.
"Poor, gossiping old thing!" he said. "She has been very kind to me. It will be a shock, but she must bear it like the rest."
He took a solitary five-pound note from his pocketbook, thrust it into the envelope, wrote inside the flap, "For your own use," and moistened and secured it before placing it with the other letters.
"About nine to-morrow morning she will find it," he thought, "and then-- poor soul! poor soul! The police and--I shall be asleep."
"God--forgive me!" he said slowly as, after a step in front of the easy-chair he had placed ready, he once more raised the glass, and closing his eyes:
"To Myra," he said, with a bitter laugh; and it was nearly at his lips when there was a sharp double knock at his outer door.
A fierce look of anger came into his countenance as he stood glaring in the direction of the summons. Then, raising the glass again, he was about to drink when there was a louder knocking.
Stratton hesitated, set down the glass, crossed the room, and threw open the doors, first one and then the other, with the impression upon him that by some means his intentions had been divined and that it was the police.
"Having a nap, old fellow?" cried Guest hurriedly, as he stepped in, Stratton involuntarily giving way. "I was crossing the inn and saw your light. Thought I'd drop in for a few moments before going to my perch."
He did not say that he had been pacing the inn and its precincts for hours, longing to hear the result of his friend's visit to Bourne Square, but unable to make up his mind to go up till the last, when, in a fit of desperation, he had mounted the stairs.
"I will not quarrel with him if he is the winner. One was obliged to go down. I can't afford to lose lover and friend in one day, even if it does make one sore."
He had taken that sentence and said it in a hundred different ways that evening, and it was upon his lips as he had at last knocked at Stratton's door.
Upon his first entrance he had not noticed anything particular in his friend, being in a feverish, excited state, full of his own disappointment; but as Stratton remained silent, gazing hard at him, he looked in his face wonderingly; and as, by the half light, he made out his haggard countenance and the wild, staring look in his eyes, a rush of hope sent the blood bubbling, as it were, through his veins. "Has she refused him?" rang in his ears, and, speechless for the moment, with his heart throbbing wildly, and his throat hot and dry, he took a step forward as he saw _carafe_ and water glass before him, caught up the latter, and raised it to his lips.
But only to start back in wonder and alarm, for, with a hoarse cry, Stratton struck the glass from his hand, scattered its contents over the hearthrug, and the glass itself flew into fragments against the bars of the grate.
"Here, what's the matter with you, old fellow?" cried Guest wonderingly. "Don't act like that."
Stratton babbled a few incoherent words, and sank back in the lounge, covering his face with his hands, and a hoarse hysterical cry escaped from his lips.
Guest looked at him in astonishment, then at the table, where, in the broad circle of light, he saw the letters his friend had written, one being directed to himself.
They explained little, but the next instant he saw the wide-mouthed, stoppered bottle, caught it up, examined the label, and held it at arm's length.
"The cyanide!" he cried excitedly. "Mal! Stratton, old chap! Good God! You surely--no, it is impossible. Speak to me, old man! Tell me, or I shall go mad! Did Edie refuse you?"
Stratton's hands dropped from his face as he rose in his seat, staring wildly at his friend.
"Edie!" he said wonderingly.
"Yes, Edie!" cried Guest excitedly as he bent down toward his friend. "Here, stop a minute; what shall I do with this cursed stuff?"
Striding to the window, he threw it open, leaned out, and dashed the bottle down upon the pavement, shivering it and its contents to fragments.
"Now speak," he cried as soon as he had returned. "No fooling, man; speak the truth."
"Edie?" said Stratton again as he sat there trembling as if smitten by some dire disease.
"Yes. You told me you were going to tell her of your success--to ask the admiral to give you leave to speak to her."
"No, no," said Stratton slowly.
"Are you mad, or have you been drinking?" cried Guest angrily, and he caught his friend by the shoulders.
"Don't--don't, Percy," said Stratton feebly. "I'm not myself to-night. I--I--Why did you come?" he asked vacantly.
"Because it was life or death to me," cried Guest. "I couldn't say a word to you then, but I've loved little Edie ever since we first met. You were my friend, Mal, and I couldn't say anything when I saw you two so thick together. She seemed to prefer your society to mine, and she had a right to choose. I've been half-mad to-day since you told me you cared for her, but I couldn't sleep till I knew all the worst."
"I told you I loved Edith Perrin?"
"Yes! Are you so stupefied by what you have taken that you don't know what you are saying?"
"I know what I am saying," said Stratton, almost in a whisper. "I never told you that."
"I swear you did, man. You don't know what you say."
"I told you I was going to see the admiral. All a mistake--your's-- mine," he gasped feebly.
"What do you mean?" cried Guest, shaking him.
"I always liked little Edie, but it was Myra I loved."
"What?" cried Guest wildly.
"I spoke to her father to-day, plainly, as--as--an honest man. Too late, old fellow; too late."
"Too late?"
"She is engaged--to be married--to the admiral's friend."
"Barron?"
"Yes."
"I thought as much. Then it was all a mistake about Edie!" cried Guest wildly. "I beg your pardon, Mal. I'm excited, too. I'm awfully sorry, though, old man. But tell me," he cried, changing his manner. "Those letters--that glass? Great Heavens! You were never going to be such a madman, such an idiot, as to--Oh, say it was all a mistake!"
"That I should have been a dead man by this?" said Stratton solemnly. "That was no mistake," he murmured piteously. "What is there to live for now?" _