Tell me, how does that
little sport you call Blackie happen to have so much
ready cash? I've never yet struck him for a loan that he
hasn't obliged me. I think he's sweet on you, perhaps,
and thinks he's doing you a sort of second-hand favor."
At times such as these all the old spirit that I had
thought dead within me would rise up in revolt against
this creature who was taking, from me my pride, my sense
of honor, my friends. I never saw Von Gerhard now.
Peter had refused outright to go to him for treatment,
saying that he wasn't going to be poisoned by any cursed
doctor, particularly not by one who had wanted to run away
with his wife before his very eyes.
Sometimes I wondered how long this could go on. I
thought of the old days with the Nirlangers; of Alma
Pflugel's rose-encircled cottage; of Bennie; of the
Knapfs; of the good-natured, uncouth aborigines, and
their many kindnesses. I saw these dear people rarely
now. Frau Nirlanger's resignation to her unhappiness
only made me rebel more keenly against my own.
If only Peter could become well and strong again, I
told myself, bitterly. If it were not for those blue
shadows under his eyes, and the shrunken muscles, and the
withered skin, I could leave him to live his life as he
saw fit.
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