“You drunken beast!” he gritted in merciless fury, and stepped suddenly forward.
But halfway across the room he halted as though turned to stone. Hawkins wasn't lurching any more. Hawkins had turned and closed the door; and Hawkins now, with his face white and drawn, a look in his old blue eyes that mingled agony and an utter hopelessness, sank into a chair and buried his face in his hands.
It was Paul Veniza who moved now. He went and stood behind the old cabman.
“You are sober. What does this mean?” Paul Veniza asked heavily.
“I couldn't do it,” he said in a broken voice. “And--and I've settled it once for all now. I got to thinking as I came along to-night, and I found out that it wasn't any good for me to swear I wasn't going to touch anything any more. I'm afraid of myself. I--I came near going into the saloon. It--it taught me something, that did; because the only way I could get by was to promise myself I'd go back there after I'd been here.”
Hawkins paused. A flush dyed his cheeks. He turned around and looked at Paul Veniza again, and then at John Bruce.
“You don't understand--neither of you understand. Once I promised Claire that I'd stop, and--and until just now she believed me. And I've hurt her. But I ain't broken her heart. It was only old Hawkins, just Hawkins, who promised her then; it would have been her _father_ who promised her to-night, and--and it ain't any good, I'd have broken that promise, I know it now--and she ain't ever going to share that shame.”
Hawkins brushed his hands across his eyes.
“And then,” he went on, A sudden fierceness in his voice, “suppose she'd had that on top of Crang, 'cause it ain't sure that knowing who I am would have saved her from him! Oh, my God, she'd better be dead! I'd rather see her dead. You're wrong, John Bruce! It wasn't the way. You meant right, and God bless you; but it wasn't the way. I saw it all so clearly after--after I'd got past that saloon; and--and then it was all right for me to promise myself that I'd go back. It wouldn't hurt her none then.”
“I don't quite understand what you mean by that, Hawkins,” he said a little huskily.
“I dressed all up for this,” said Hawkins, with a wan smile; “but something's snapped here--inside here.” His hand felt a little aimlessly over his heart. “I know now that I ain't ever going to be worthy; and I know now that she ain't ever to know that I--that I--I'm her old daddy. And so I--I've fixed it just now like you saw so there ain't no going back on it. But I ain't throwing my little girl down. It ain't Claire that's got to be made change her mind--_it's Crang_.” He raised a clenched fist. “And Crang's going to change it! I can swear to _that_ and know I'll keep it, so--so help me, God! And when she's rid of him, she ain't going to have no shame and sorrow from me. That's what I meant.”