Also he waited for word out of Egypt; and he had a
superstitious belief that David would return, that any day might see him
entering the door of the Red Mansion.
Eglington himself was haunted by a spectre which touched his elbow by
day, and said: "You are not the Earl of Eglington," and at night laid a
clammy finger on his forehead, waking him, and whispering in his ear: "If
Soolsby had touched the wire, all would now be well!" And as deep as
thought and feeling in him lay, he felt that Fate had tricked him--Fate
and Hylda. If Hylda had not come at that crucial instant, the
chairmaker's but on the hill would be empty. Why had not Soolsby told the
world the truth since? Was the man waiting to see what course he himself
would take? Had the old chair-maker perhaps written the truth to the
Egyptian--to his brother David.
His brother! The thought irritated every nerve in him. No note of
kindness or kinship or blood stirred in him. If, before, he had had
innate antagonism and a dark, hovering jealousy, he had a black
repugnance now--the antipathy of the lesser to the greater nature, of the
man in the wrong to the man in the right.
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