"
"Most people do," said Nick. "I believe it's my physiognomy that's
at fault. What can any one expect from a fellow with a face like an
Egyptian mummy? Why, I've been mistaken for the devil himself before
now." He spoke with a semi-whimsical ruefulness, and, having spoken,
he went to the window and stood there with his face to the darkness.
"Hear that jackal, Will?" he suddenly said. "The brute is hungry. You
bet, he won't go empty away."
"Jackals never do," said Will, with his weary sigh.
Nick turned round. "It shows what faithless fools we are," he said.
In the silence that followed, there came again to them, clear through
the stillness, and haunting in its persistence, the crying of the
beast that sought its meat from God.
CHAPTER XXV
A SCENTED LETTER
There is no exhaustion more complete or more compelling than the
exhaustion of grief, and it is the most restless temperaments that
usually suffer from it the most keenly. It is those who have watched
constantly, tirelessly, selflessly, for weeks or even months, for whom
the final breakdown is the most utter and the most heartrending.
To Daisy, lying silent in her darkened room, the sudden ending of the
prolonged strain, the cessation of the anxiety that had become a part
of her very being, was more intolerable than the sense of desolation
itself.
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