The Lamp in the Desert | Page 7

his closed fist.
Stella drew a quick breath. Her eyes were wide open again. She sat up.
"Why did you do that?"
He looked at her again, a smouldering gleam in his eyes. "It was on its way to destruction," he said.
"And so you helped it!"
He nodded. "Yes. Long-drawn-out agonies don't attract me."
Stella laughed softly, yet with a touch of mockery. "Oh, it was an act of mercy, was it? You didn't look particularly merciful. In fact, that is about the last quality I should have attributed to you."
"I don't think," Monck said very quietly, "that you are in a position to judge me." She leaned forward. He saw that her bosom was heaving. "That is your prerogative, isn't it?" she said. "I--I am just the prisoner at the bar, and--like the moth--I have been condemned--without mercy."
He raised his brows sharply. For a second he had the look of a man who has been stabbed in the back. Then with a swift effort he pulled himself together.
In the same moment Stella rose. She was smiling, and there was a red flush in her cheeks. She took her fan from the table.
"And now," she said, "I am going to dance--all night long. Every officer in the mess--save one--has asked me for a dance."
He was on his feet in an instant. He had checked one impulse, but even to his endurance there were limits. He spoke as one goaded.
"Will you give me one?"
She looked him squarely in the eyes. "No, Captain Monck."
His dark face looked suddenly stubborn. "I don't often dance," he said. "I wasn't going to dance to-night. But--I will have one--I must have one--with you."
"Why?" Her question fell with a crystal clearness. There was something of crystal hardness in her eyes.
But the man was undaunted. "Because you have wronged me, and you owe me reparation."
"I--have wronged--you!" She spoke the words slowly, still looking him in the eyes.
He made an abrupt gesture as of holding back some inner force that strongly urged him. "I am not one of your persecutors," he said. "I have never in my life presumed to judge you--far less condemn you."
His voice vibrated as though some emotion fought fiercely for the mastery. They stood facing each other in what might have been open antagonism but for that deep quiver in the man's voice.
Stella spoke after the lapse of seconds. She had begun to tremble.
"Then why--why did you let me think so? Why did you always stand aloof?"
There was a tremor in her voice also, but her eyes were shining with the light half-eager, half-anxious, of one who seeks for buried treasure.
Monck's answer was pitched very low. It was as if the soul of him gave utterance to the words. "It is my nature to stand aloof. I was waiting."
"Waiting?" Her two hands gripped suddenly hard upon her fan, but still her shining eyes did not flinch from his. Still with a quivering heart she searched.
Almost in a whisper came his reply. "I was waiting--till my turn should come."
"Ah!" The fan snapped between her hands; she cast it from her with a movement that was almost violent.
Monck drew back sharply. With a smile that was grimly cynical he veiled his soul. "I was a fool, of course, and I am quite aware that my foolishness is nothing to you. But at least you know now how little cause you have to hate me."
She had turned from him and gone to the open window. She stood there bending slightly forward, as one who strains for a last glimpse of something that has passed from sight.
Monck remained motionless, watching her. From another room near by there came the sound of Tommy's humming and the cheery pop of a withdrawn cork.
Stella spoke at last, in a whisper, and as she spoke the strain went out of her attitude and she drooped against the wood-work of the window as if spent. "Yes; but I know--too late."
The words reached him though he scarcely felt that they were intended to do so. He suffered them to go into silence; the time for speech was past.
The seconds throbbed away between them. Stella did not move or speak again, and at last Monck turned from her. He picked up the broken fan, and with a curious reverence he laid it out of sight among some books on the table.
Then he stood immovable as granite and waited.
There came the sound of Tommy's footsteps, and in a moment the door was flung open. Tommy advanced with all a host's solicitude.
"Oh, I say, I'm awfully sorry to have kept you waiting so long. That silly ass of a khit had cleared off and left us nothing to drink. Stella, we shall miss all the fun if we don't hurry up. Come on, Monck, old chap, say when!"
He stopped at the table, and