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Ian had saved her from the result of Rudyard's rash retaliation and fury, and had then repulsed her, bidden her stand off from him with a magnanimity and a chivalry which had humiliated her. He had protected her from the shame of an open tragedy, and then had shut the door in her face.
Barry Whalen thought carefully of what he should say, because the instinct of the friend who loved his friend had told him that, since the night at De Lancy Scovel's house when the name of Mennaval had been linked so hatefully with that of Byng's wife, there had been a cloud over Rudyard's life; and that Rudyard and Jasmine were not the same as of yore. "Naturally she was upset," he repeated.
Rudyard Byng was his friend, whose bread he had eaten, whom he had known since they were boys at school. He remembered acutely Rudyard's words to him that fateful night when he had dined with Jasmine alone "You will have much to talk about, to say to each other, such old friends as you are."
As the flask was at Rudyard's lips, Barry Whalen said to Krool, "What do you stay here as deserter or prisoner? It's got to be one or the other." "Prisoner," answered Krool. Then he added, "See the Baas." Rudyard's eyes were open. "Prisoner who is a prisoner?" he asked feebly. "Me, Baas," whispered Krool, leaning over him. "He saved your life, Colonel," interposed Barry Whalen.
It was a devilish revenge, which he could not resent. But time he must have time; therefore he would do Rudyard's bidding, and read this thing he had written, look at it with eyes in which Penalty was gathering its mists.
He was face to face with Rudyard's tragedy, and with his own.... She, Jasmine, to whom he had given all, for whom he had been ready to give up all career, fame, existence was true to none, unfaithful to all, caring for none, but pretending to care for all three and for how many others? He choked back a cry. "Well well?" came the husband's voice across the table.
As she turned to go from the room, Rudyard's portrait on the wall met her eyes. "I can't go on, Rudyard," she said to it. "I know that now." Out in the streets, which Ian Stafford travelled with hasty steps, the newsboys were calling: "War declared! All about the war!" "That is the way out for me," Stafford said, aloud, as he hastened on.
Corporal Shorter's tale of Rudyard's heroism had stirred her; but she could not have said quite what her feeling was with regard to it. She only knew vaguely that she was glad of it in a more personal than impersonal way.
Upon her now this announcement came with crushing force. Adrian Fellowes had gained from her she knew it all too well now that which had injured her husband; from which, at any rate, he ought to have been immune. Her face flushed with a resentment far greater than that of Rudyard's, and it was heightened by a humiliation which overwhelmed her.
On Rudyard's lips was a faint smile, but it lacked the old bonhomie which was part of his natural equipment; and there were still sharp, haggard traces of the agitation which had accompanied the expulsion of Krool. For an instant the idea possessed her that she would tell him everything there was to tell, and face the consequences, no matter what they might be.