The Folly of Desire

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• 1915
• 0 hr 50 mins
• Drama

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In an eastern palace the fair Shulamite awakened love in an aged King and death and fears were the ministers of that love. Long centuries afterward a girl at the door of an African hut woke passion in the heart of an old Boer farmer. Simeon Krillet wedded the penniless Deborah, to the disgust of his sister, Tant Anna, and the secret grief of that sister's son, Jan. He loved her, but only as the dearest of his chattels, something of which he was absolute master. To this household came Robert Waring, seeking forgetfulness of his wife, a morphine fiend. A fierce pity awoke in him for the "poor little Shulamite." He was kind to her; he gave her a book; he threatened the life of her husband if he struck her again. Krillet found her reading, and Deborah stopped the uplifted jambok with a lie prompted by mortal terror: "Do you want to kill a woman and her child?" A storm threatened. Waring was off to town to buy stores. Krillet, now subdued, asked him to bring back books for his wife. He went to the Englishman's room and was attracted by the binding of his diary. He opened it, and this met his eyes: '"What will Krillet do when he finds out that she has lied to him? I wish I could take her away." Mad with rage, the old man showed his wife the book. She seized it joyously, quite content to die since she had won the love of the Englishman. Krillett ordered his wife to put on her wedding gown, and went out to dig her grave. Then he took her to the burial field. Deborah's little Kaffir maid warned Waring. Deborah was saved and Krillet was killed by a flash of lightning just as the Kaffir girl fired. Deborah insisted that the dead man be buried at once. When it was over the strain and exposure brought on a fever which nearly proved fatal to Waring. Deborah's nursing saved Waring's life. He was filled with passionate love and gratitude, but the figure of his wife Joan stood ever between him and Deborah. Meanwhile the mail from England brought news of Joan's illness, of her desperate effort to conquer her vice: Waring was told that it was his place to help his wife; Joan was even then on her way to him. Deborah sadly assented; his duty was clear. Deborah and Waring were left alone but the departing Boers almost brushed the skirts of an Englishwoman at the door of the farm. It was Joan, at the point of death, who had come to her husband. She died with his forgiveness. Deborah comforted the bewildered, suffering man.