Motion Picture Magazine (Feb-Jul 1920)

Inga shook her head. "You were that already, my friend," she said ; "it was all for me. . . . Then, after that, you helped me thru the course I took by money. . ." terly hurt. This raillery night. Once upon a time she would not have dared to go to him so, to so assail his dignity. That was gone now. It hung about him iti pitiful shreds. He had been, she could tell, bit . this sardonicism . . . that drink last night . . . this wasted frame and weary eyes . . . what had done these things to him ? Stroking his brow with her temperate fingertips, she asked him. For quite a long while there was silence. Inga felt that he was doing battle with the reticence he had used, heretofore, as a wall, a barrier, between himself and infringement. Then he began to speak, in rushes of words, fragmentary, detachedly. "You know that I was married . . ."he began, almost /T\ in an accusatory tone ; "I . . .1 was in love, too. In Jag£ love with my wife. Odd . . . terribly in love with her. I was jealous, too. I hated the eyes of other men upon her; the hands of other men to touch her ; the thoughts of other men to prey upon her. I used to feel that, if ever I saw another man kiss her, I would go, mad ... or die. I used to pray, at nights, by her side, that life would spare me this one unbearable thing. It ... it didn't. One night I went home from my studio, awfully happy. She had been tender that morning and it was the eve of our wedding anniversary. She hadn't mentioned it in the morning, and I thought that she had kept, silence because she believed / had forgotten and she didn't want to appear indelicate. It was she — who had forgotten. On my way home that night I bought bride's roses, great quantities of them. I wanted to fill her room with them, have them on our table, see them on her breast. I sang little snatches of song on my way I think the snatches were from the song you had been singing that day when you came to see me, in the afternoon. Your visit that day is vivid to me . . . still. Strange. Well ... I reached home. I was earlier than usual ... my eagerness, no doubt. I went in quietly, thinking to surprise her. I did. She was in the arms of some other man, a man I knew slightly. He was her lover. She was using endearments to him she had used to me. The tones of her voice were the same tones, the cling of he'r arms held the same tenderness, the light that illumined her face was the light that had remade my world for me. I thought of the title, 'False Dawn.' "I suppose I lost my head. I sup^ pose I went raving mad. I know that I shrieked and tore at things. I know that I saw red and black shot with red, and thru the mad swirl of the . murder tints her white, disdainful face. I knew that it was disdainful, that it continued disdainful thruout. I knew, clearly, in the midst of my rage, that she did not love me, never had, never would. I knew, too, that she did not love this man who had been on her breast, nor could she ever love any man. This, somehow, was the bitterest thought of all. It was the ultimate futility. I told her I would never see her again . . . never. I . . ." Garford's voice sank down, lost its strength. ''I . . . never have," he said. Inga's fingers, tense during his recital, resumed their careful stroking. She did not speak for -a moment, then she said, very calmly, ''You must not excite yourself, you know, dear friend. That is what the doctor warned against last night. That is why I kept you here. You are not awfully fit, just now." Garford rose, lighting another cigaret. "You talk well," he said, swaying almost in rhythm to each syllable ; "you talk well — you always did. But — you're a woman. You're a woman. That's enough. There's no gratitude in any woman. I know. You see, I know. Just the _