Page:George Gibbs--Love of Monsieur.djvu/48

 grief-ridden beldam than the fiery, impulsive devil-may-care of the Fleece Tavern. When he again reached the protecting shadow he sank upon a neighboring doorstep and buried his face in his knees, the very picture of despair. No sound escaped him. It was the tumultuous, silent man-grief which burns and sears into the soul like hot iron, but knows no saving relief in sob or tear. Once or twice the shoulders tremulously rose and fell, and the arms strained and writhed around the up-bent knees in an agony of self-restraint. Ten, fifteen minutes he sat there, lost to all sense of time or distance, until his struggle was over. Then he raised his head, and, catching his breath sharply, arose.

“If there were but an end,” he sighed aloud, constrainedly—“an end to it all!”

Then a bitter laugh broke from him.

“It is true—what she said was true. I am a loathsome creature—a thing, a creeping thing, that lives because it must, because, like a toad or a lizard, it is too mean to kill.” There was a long silence. At last he brushed his hand 36