Chapter XVII. Facing the Worst - Page 2

"Everything he knew, my poor child. Oh, Muriel, Muriel, don't ask me what it is. It's too terrible to tell you."

Muriel clasped her white hands together, held bloodless downward, and looked at him fixedly. "Mali, you can go," she said. And the Shadow, rising up with childish confidence, glided from the hut, and left them, for the first time since their arrival on the central island, alone together.

Muriel looked at him once more with the same deadly fixed look. "With you, Felix," she said, slowly, "I can bear or dare anything. I feel as if the bitterness of death were past long ago. I know it must come. I only want to be quite sure when.... And besides, you must remember, I have your promise."

Felix clasped his own hands despondently in return, and gazed across at her from his seat a few feet off in unspeakable misery.

"Muriel," he cried, "I couldn't. I haven't the heart. I daren't."

Muriel rose and laid her hand solemnly on his arm. "You will!" she answered, boldly. "You can! You must! I know I can trust your promise for that. This moment, if you like. I would not shrink. But you will never let me fall alive into the hands of those wretches. Felix, from your hand I could stand anything. I'm not afraid to die. I love you too dearly."

Felix held her white little wrist in his grasp and sobbed like a child. Her very bravery and confidence seemed to unman him, utterly.

She looked at him once more. "When?" she asked, quietly, but with lips as pale as death.

"In about four months from now," Felix answered, endeavoring to be calm.

"And they will kill us both?"

"Yes, both. I think so."

"Together?"

"Together."

Muriel drew a deep sigh.

"Will you know the day beforehand?" she asked.

"Yes. The Frenchman told me it. He has known others killed in the self-same fashion."

"Then, Felix---the night before it comes, you will promise me, will you?"

"Muriel, Muriel, I could never dare to kill you."

She laid her hand soothingly on his. She stroked him gently. "You are a man," she said, looking up into his eyes with confidence. "I trust you. I believe in you. I know you will never let these savages hurt me.... Felix, in spite of everything, I've been happier since we came to this island together than ever I have been in my life before. I've had my wish. I didn't want to miss in life the one thing that life has best worth giving. I haven't missed it now. I know I haven't; for I love you, and you love me. After that, I can die, and die gladly. If I die with you, that's all I ask. These seven or eight terrible weeks have made me feel somehow unnaturally calm. When I came here first I