“You need not be afraid,” he said. “You’ve made it all too repulsive to me now, for me ever to want to open my mouth about it all. You can be quite assured: nothing will ever come out through me.”
Jack looked up with a faint, sneering smile.
“And you think we shall be satisfied with your bare word?” he said uglily.
But now Richard looked him square in the eyes.
“Either that or nothing,” he replied.
And unconscious of what he was doing, he sat looking direct down into the dark, shifting malice of Jack’s eyes. Till Jack turned aside. Richard was now so angry and insulted he felt only pure indignation.
“We’ll see,” said Jack.
Somers did not even heed him. He was too indignant to think of him any more. He only retreated into his own soul, and turned aside, invoking his own soul: “Oh, dark God, smite him over the mouth for insulting me. Be with me, gods of the other world, and strike down these liars.”
Harriet came out on to the verandah.
“What are you two men talking about?” she said. “I hear two very cross and snarling voices, though I can’t tell what they say.”