The Classic Mystery Collection - Arthur Conan Doyle [3747]
But the rest must be told; his brother exacted it and so did the situation. Further waiting, further hiding of the truth would be insupportable after this. But oh, the bitterness of it! No wonder that she turned away from those frenzied, wildly-demanding eyes.
"Doris?"
She trembled and looked behind her. She had not recognised his voice. Had another entered? Had his brother dared--No, they were alone; seemingly so, that is. She knew,--no one better--that they were not really alone, that witnesses were within hearing, if not within sight.
"Doris," he urged again, and this time she turned in his direction and gazed, aghast. If the voice were strange, what of the face which now confronted her. The ravages of sickness had been marked, but they were nothing to those made in an instant by a blasting grief. She was startled, although expecting much, and could only press his hands while she waited for the question he was gathering strength to utter. It was simple when it came; just two words:
"How long?"
She answered them as simply.
"Just as long as you have been ill," said she; then, with no attempt to break the inevitable shock, she went on: "Miss Challoner was struck dead and you were taken down with typhoid on the self-same day."
"Struck dead! Why do you use that word, struck? Struck dead! she, a young woman. Oh, Doris, an accident! My darling has been killed in an accident!"
"They do not call it accident. They call it what it never was. What it never was," she insisted, pressing him back with frightened hands, as he strove to rise. "Miss Challoner was--" How nearly the word shot had left her lips. How fiercely above all else, in that harrowing moment had risen the desire to fling the accusation of that word into the ears of him who listened from his secret hiding-place. But she refrained out of compassion for the man she loved, and declared instead, "Miss Challoner died from a wound; how given, why given, no one knows. I had rather have died myself than have to tell you this. Oh, Mr. Brotherson, speak, sob, do anything but--"
She started back, dropping his hands as she did so. With quick intuition she saw that he must be left to himself if he were to meet this blow without succumbing. The body must have freedom if the spirit would not go mad. Conscious, or perhaps not conscious, of his release from her restraining hand, albeit profiting by it, he staggered to his feet, murmuring that word of doom: "Wound! wound! my darling died of a wound! What kind of a wound?" he suddenly thundered out. "I cannot understand what you mean by wound. Make it clear to me. Make it clear to me at once. If I must bear this grief, let me know its whole depth. Leave nothing to my imagination or I cannot answer for myself. Tell it all, Doris."
And Doris told him:
"She was on the mezzanine floor of the hotel where she lives. She was seemingly happy and had been writing a letter--a letter to me which they never forwarded. There was no one else by but some strangers--good people whom one must believe. She was crossing the floor when suddenly she threw up her hands and fell. A thin, narrow paper-cutter was in her grasp; and it flew into the lobby. Some say she struck herself with that cutter; for when they picked her up they found a wound in her breast which that cutter might have made."
"Edith? never!"
The words were chokingly said; he was swaying, almost falling, but he steadied himself.
"Who says that?" he asked.
"It was the coroner's verdict."
"And she died that way--died?"
"Immediately."
"After writing to you?"
"Yes."
"What was in that letter?"
"Nothing of threat, they say. Only just cheer and expressions of hope. Just like the others, Mr. Brotherson."
"And they accuse her of taking her own life? Their verdict is a lie. They did not know her."
Then, after some moments of wild and confused feeling, he declared, with a desperate effort at self-control: "You said