He moved slowly back over the desolate tracks of land stretched between
him and the Algerian halting-place. He had no fear that he would find
his brother there. He knew too well the nature with which he had to deal
to hope that old affection would so have outweighed present fear that
his debtor would have stayed to meet him yet once more. On the impulse
of the ungovernable pain which the other's presence had been, he had
bidden him leave Africa at once; now he almost wished he had bid him
stay. There was a weary, unsatisfied longing for some touch of love
or of gratitude from this usurper, whom he had raised in his place. He
would have been rewarded enough if one sign of gladness that he lived
had broken through the egotism and the stricken fear of the man whom he
remembered as a little golden-headed child, with the hand of their dying
mother lying in benediction on the fair, silken curls.
He had asked no questions. He had gone back to no recriminations. He
guessed all it needed him to know; and he recoiled from the recital of
the existence whose happiness was purchased by his own misery, and whose
dignity was built on sand. His sacrifice had not been in vain. Placed
out of the reach of temptation, the plastic, feminine, unstable
character had been without a stain in the sight of men. But it was
little better at the core; and he wondered, in his suffering, as he went
onward through the beauty of the young day, whether it had been worth
the bitter price he had paid to raise this bending reed from out the
waters which would have broken and swamped it at the outset.
Pages:
672
673
674
675
676
677
678
679
680
681
682
683
684
685
686
687
688
689
690
691
692
693
694
695
696