IV

The men went out shooting directly after breakfast, and we women

passed the day in orthodox country-house fashion,--working and

eating; walking and riding; driving and playing croquet; and above,

beyond, and through all things, chattering. Beyond a passing sigh

while I was washing my hands, or a moment of mournful remembrance

while I changed my dress, I had scarcely time even to regret the

quiet happiness of the week that was past. In the evening we

danced in the great hall. I had two valses with Alan. During a

pause for breath, I found that we were standing near the fireplace,

on the very spot where he and George had stood on the previous

afternoon. The recollection made me involuntarily glance up at his

face. It looked sad and worried, and the thought suddenly struck

me that his extravagant spirits of the night before, and even his

quieter, careful cheerfulness of to-night, had been but artificial

moods at best. He turned, and finding my eyes fixed on him, at

once plunged into conversation, discussed the peculiarities of one

of the guests, good-humoredly enough, but with so much fun as to

make me laugh in spite of myself. Then we danced again. The

plaintive music, the smooth floor, and the partner were all alike

perfect, and I experienced that entire delight of physical

enjoyment which I believe nothing but a valse under such

circumstances can give. When it was over I turned to Alan, and

exclaimed with impulsive appeal, "Oh, I am so happy,--you must be

happy too!" He smiled rather uncertainly, and answered, "Don't

bother yourself about me, Evie, I am all right. I told you that we

Mervyns had bad nerves; and I am rather tired. That's all." I was

too passionately determined just then upon happiness, and his was

too necessary to mine for me not to believe that he was speaking

the truth.

We kept up the dancing till Lucy discovered with a shock that

midnight had struck, and that Sunday had begun, and we were all

sent off to bed. I was not long in making my nightly preparations,

and had scarcely inserted myself between the sheets when, with a

few long moans, the wind began again, more violently even than the

night before. It had been a calm, fine day, and I made wise

reflections as I listened upon the uncertainty of the north-country

climate. What a tempest it was! How it moaned, and howled, and

shrieked! Where had I heard the superstition which now came to my

mind, that borne upon the wind come the spirits of the drowned,

wailing and crying for the sepulture which had been denied them?

But there were other sounds in that wind, too. Evil, murderous

thoughts, perhaps, which had never taken body in deeds, but which,

caught up in the air, now hurled themselves in impotent fury

through the world. How I wished the wind would stop. It seemed

full of horrible fancies, and it kept knocking them into my head,

and it wouldn't leave off. Fancies, or memories--which?--and my

mind reverted with a flash to the fearful thoughts which had

haunted it the day before in Dame Alice's tower. It was dark now.

Those ghastly intangible shapes must have taken full form and

color, peopling the old ruin with their ageless hideousness. And

the storm had found them there and borne them along with it as it

blew through the creviced walls. That was why the wind's sound

struck so strangely on my brain. Ah! I could hear them now, those

still living memories of dead horror. Through the window crannies

they came shrieking and wailing. They filled the chimney with

spirit sobs, and now they were pressing on, crowding through the

room,--eager, eager to reach their prey. Nearer they came;--nearer

still! They were round my bed now! Through my closed eyelids I

could almost see their dreadful shapes; in all my quivering flesh I

felt their terrors as they bent over me,--lower, lower. . . .

With a start I aroused myself and sat up. Was I asleep or awake?

I was trembling all over still, and it required the greatest effort

of courage I had ever made to enable me to spring from my bed and

strike a light. What a state my nerves or my digestion must be in!

From my childhood the wind had always affected me strangely, and I

blamed myself now for allowing my imagination to run away with me

at the first. I found a novel which I had brought up to my room

with me, one of the modern, Chinese-American school, where human

nature is analyzed with the patient, industrious indifference of

the true Celestial. I took the book to bed with me, and soon under

its soothing influences fell asleep. I dreamt a good deal,--

nightmares, the definite recollection of which, as is so often the

case, vanished from my mind as soon as I awoke, leaving only a

vague impression of horror. They had been connected with the wind,

of that alone I was conscious, and I went down to breakfast,

maliciously hoping that others' rest had been as much disturbed as

my own.

To my surprise, however, I found that I had again been the only

sufferer. Indeed, so impressed were most of the party with the

quiet in which their night had been passed, that they boldly

declared my storm to have been the creature of my dreams. There is

nothing more annoying when you feel yourself aggrieved by fate than

to be told that your troubles have originated in your own fancy; so

I dropped the subject. Though the discussion spread for a few

minutes round the whole table, Alan took no part in it. Neither

did George, except for what I thought a rather unnecessarily rough

expression of his disbelief in the cause of my night's disturbance.

As we rose from breakfast I saw Alan glance towards his brother,

and make a movement, evidently with the purpose of speaking to him.

Whether or not George was aware of the look or action, I cannot

say; but at the same moment he made rapidly across the room to

where one of his principal guests was standing, and at once engaged

him in conversation. So earnestly and so volubly was he borne on,

that they were still talking together when we ladies appeared again

some minutes later, prepared for our walk to church. That was not

the only occasion during the day on which I witnessed as I thought

the same by-play going on. Again and again Alan appeared to be

making efforts to engage George in private conversation, and again

and again the latter successfully eluded him.

The church was about a mile away from the house, and as Lucy did

not like having the carriages out on a Sunday, one service a week

as a rule contented the household. In the afternoon we took the

usual Sunday walk. On returning from it, I had just taken off my

outdoor things, and was issuing from my bedroom, when I found

myself face to face with Alan. He was coming out of George's

study, and had succeeded apparently in obtaining that interview for

which he had been all day seeking. One glance at his face told me

what its nature had been. We paused opposite each other for a

moment, and he looked at me earnestly.

"Are you going to church?" he inquired at last, abruptly.

"No," I answered, with some surprise. "I did not know that any one

was going this evening."

"Will you come with me?"

"Yes, certainly; if you don't mind waiting a moment for me to put

my things on."

"There's plenty of time," he answered; "meet me in the hall."

A few minutes later we started.

It was a calm, cloudless night, and although the moon was not yet

half-full, and already past her meridian, she filled the clear air

with gentle light. Not a word broke our silence. Alan walked

hurriedly, looking straight before him, his head upright, his lips

twitching nervously, while every now and then a half-uttered moan

escaped unconsciously from between them. At last I could bear it

no longer, and burst forth with the first remark which occurred to

me. We were passing a big, black, queer-shaped stone standing in

rather a lonely uncultivated spot at one end of the garden. It was

an old acquaintance of my childhood; but my thoughts had been

turned towards it now from the fact that I could see it from my

bedroom window, and had been struck afresh by its uncouth,

incongruous appearance.

"Isn't there some story connected with that stone?" I asked. "I

remember that we always called it the Dead Stone as children."

Alan cast a quick, sidelong glance in that direction, and his brows

contracted in an irritable frown. "I don't know," he answered

shortly; "they say that there is a woman buried beneath it, I

believe."

"A woman buried there!" I exclaimed in surprise; "but who?"

"How should I know? They know nothing whatever about it. The

place is full of stupid traditions of that kind." Then, looking

suspiciously round at me, "Why do you ask?"

"I don't know; it was just something to say," I answered

plaintively. His strange mood so worked upon my nerves, that it

was all that I could do to restrain my tears. I think that my tone

struck his conscience, for he made a few feverish attempts at

conversation after that. But they were so entirely abortive that

he soon abandoned the effort, and we finished our walk to church as

speechlessly as we had begun it.

The service was bright, and the sermon perhaps a little

commonplace, but sensible as it seemed to me in matter, and

adequate in style. The peaceful evening hymn which followed, the

short solemn pause of silent prayer at the end, soothed and

refreshed my spirit. A hasty glance at my companion's face as he

stood waiting for me in the porch, with the full light from the

church streaming round him, assured me that the same influence had

touched him too. Haggard and sad he still looked, it is true; but

his features were composed, and the expression of actual pain had

left his eyes.

Silent as we had come we started homeward through the waning

moonlight, but this silence was of a very different nature to the

other, and after a minute or two I did not hesitate to break it.

"It was a good sermon?" I observed, interrogatively.

"Yes," he assented, "I suppose you would call it so; but I confess

that I should have found the text more impressive without its

exposition."

"Poor man!"

"But don't you often find it so?" he asked. "Do you not often

wish, to take this evening's instance, that clergymen would infuse

themselves with something of St. Paul's own spirit? Then perhaps

they would not water all the strength out of his words in their

efforts to explain them."

"That is rather a large demand to make upon them, is it not?"

"Is it?" he questioned. "I don't ask them to be inspired saints.

I don't expect St. Paul's breadth and depth of thought. But could

they not have something of his vigorous completeness, something of

the intensity of his feeling and belief? Look at the text of to-

night. Did not the preacher's examples and applications take

something from its awful unqualified strength?"

"Awful!" I exclaimed, in surprise; "that is hardly the expression I

should have used in connection with those words."

"Why not?"

"Oh, I don't know. The text is very beautiful, of course, and at

times, when people are tiresome and one ought to be nice to them,

it is very difficult to act up to. But--"

"But you think that 'awful' is rather a big adjective to use for so

small a duty," interposed Alan, and the moonlight showed the

flicker of a smile upon his face. Then he continued, gravely, "I

doubt whether you yourself realize the full import of the words.

The precept of charity is not merely a code of rules by which to

order our conduct to our neighbors; it is the picture of a

spiritual condition, and such, where it exists in us, must by its

very nature be roused into activity by anything that affects us.

So with this particular injunction, every circumstance in our lives

is a challenge to it, and in presence of all alike it admits of one

attitude only: 'Beareth all things, endureth all things.' I hope

it will be long before that 'all' sticks in your gizzard, Evie,--

before you come face to face with things which nature cannot bear,

and yet which must be borne."

He stopped, his voice quivering; and then after a pause went on

again more calmly, "And throughout it is the same. Moral precepts

everywhere, which will admit of no compromise, no limitation, and

yet which are at war with our strongest passions. If one could

only interpose some 'unless,' some 'except,' even an 'until,' which

should be short of the grave. But we cannot. The law is infinite,

universal, eternal; there is no escape, no repose. Resist, strive,

endure, that is the recurring cry; that is existence."

"And peace," I exclaimed, appealingly. "Where is there room for

peace, if that be true?"

He sighed for answer, and then in a changed and lower tone added,

"However thickly the clouds mass, however vainly we search for a

coming glimmer in their midst, we never doubt that the sky IS still

beyond--beyond and around us, infinite and infinitely restful."

He raised his eyes as he spoke, and mine followed his. We had

entered the wooded glen. Through the scanty autumn foliage we

could see the stars shining faintly in the dim moonlight, and

beyond them the deep illimitable blue. A dark world it looked,

distant and mysterious, and my young spirit rebelled at the

consolation offered me.

"Peace seems a long way off," I whispered.

"It is for me," he answered, gently; "not necessarily for you."

"Oh, but I am worse and weaker than you are. If life is to be all

warfare, I must be beaten. I cannot always be fighting."

"Cannot you? Evie, what I have been saying is true of every moral

law worth having, of every ideal of life worth striving after, that

men have yet conceived. But it is only half the truth of

Christianity. You know that. We must strive, for the promise is

to him that overcometh; but though our aim be even higher than is

that of others, we cannot in the end fail to reach it. The victory

of the Cross is ours. You know that? You believe that?"

"Yes" I answered, softly, too surprised to say more. In speaking

of religion he, as a rule, showed to the full the reserve which is

characteristic of his class and country, and this sudden outburst

was in itself astonishing; but the eager anxiety with which he

emphasized the last words of appeal impressed and bewildered me

still further. We walked on for some minutes in silence. Then

suddenly Alan stopped, and turning, took my hand in his. In what

direction his mind had been working in the interval I could not

divine; but the moment he began to speak I felt that he was now for

the first time giving utterance to what had been really at the

bottom of his thoughts the whole evening. Even in that dim light I

could see the anxious look upon his face, and his voice shook with

restrained emotion.

"Evie," he said, "have you ever thought of the world in which our

spirits dwell, as our bodies do in this one of matter and sense,

and of how it may be peopled? I know," he went on hurriedly, "that

it is the fashion nowadays to laugh at such ideas. I envy those

who have never had cause to be convinced of their reality, and I

hope that you may long remain among the number. But should that

not be so, should those unseen influences ever touch your life, I

want you to remember then, that, as one of the race for whom Christ

died, you have as high a citizenship in that spirit land as any

creature there: that you are your own soul's warden, and that

neither principalities nor powers can rob you of that your

birthright."

I think my face must have shown my bewilderment, for he dropped my

hand, and walked on with an impatient sigh.

"You don't understand me. Why should you? I dare-say that I am

talking nonsense--only--only--"

His voice expressed such an agony of doubt and hesitation that I

burst out--

"I think that I do understand you a little, Alan. You mean that

even from unearthly enemies there is nothing that we need really

fear--at least, that is, I suppose, nothing worse than death. But

that is surely enough!"

"Why should you fear death?" he said, abruptly; "your soul will

live."

"Yes, I know that, but still--" I stopped with a shudder.

"What is life after all but one long death?" he went on, with

sudden violence. "Our pleasures, our hopes, our youth are all

dying; ambition dies, and even desire at last; our passions and

tastes will die, or will live only to mourn their dead opportunity.

The happiness of love dies with the loss of the loved, and, worst

of all, love itself grows old in our hearts and dies. Why should

we shrink only from the one death which can free us from all the

others?"

"It is not true, Alan!" I cried, hotly. "What you say is not true.

There are many things even here which are living and shall live;

and if it were otherwise, in everything, life that ends in death is

better than no life at all."

"You say that," he answered, "because for you these things are yet

living. To leave life now, therefore, while it is full and sweet,

untainted by death, surely that is not a fate to fear. Better, a

thousand times better, to see the cord cut with one blow while it

is still whole and strong, and to launch out straight into the

great ocean, than to sit watching through the slow years, while

strand after strand, thread by thread, loosens and unwinds itself,--

each with its own separate pang breaking, bringing the bitterness

of death without its release.

His manner, the despairing ring in his voice, alarmed me even more

than his words. Clinging to his arm with both hands, while the

tears sprang to my eyes--

"Alan," I cried, "don't say such things,--don't talk like that.

You are making me miserable."

He stopped short at my words, with bent head, his features hidden

in the shadow thus cast upon them,--nothing in his motionless form

to show what was passing within him. Then he looked up, and turned

his face to the moonlight and to me, laying his hand on one of

mine.

"Don't be afraid," he said; "it is all right, my little David. You

have driven the evil spirit away." And lifting my hand, he pressed

it gently to his lips. Then drawing it within his arm, he went on,

as he walked forward, "And even when it was on me at its worst, I

was not meditating suicide, as I think you imagine. I am a very

average specimen of humanity,--neither brave enough to defy the

possibilities of eternity nor cowardly enough to shirk those of

time. No, I was only trying idiotically to persuade a girl of

eighteen that life was not worth living; and more futilely still,

myself, that I did not wish her to live. I am afraid, that in my

mind philosophy and fact have but small connection with each other;

and though my theorizing for your welfare may be true enough, yet,--

I cannot help it, Evie,--it would go terribly hard with me if

anything were to happen to you."

His voice trembled as he finished. My fear had gone with his

return to his natural manner, but my bewilderment remained.

"Why SHOULD there anything happen to me?" I asked.

"That is just it," he answered, after a pause, looking straight in

front of him and drawing his hand wearily over his brow. "I know

of no reason why there should." Then giving a sigh, as if finally

to dismiss from his mind a worrying subject--"I have acted for the

best," he said, "and may God forgive me if I have done wrong."

There was a little silence after that, and then he began to talk

again, steadily and quietly. The subject was deep enough still, as

deep as any that we had touched upon, but both voice and sentiment

were calm, bringing peace to my spirit, and soon making me forget

the wonder and fear of a few moments before. Very openly did he

talk as we passed on across the long trunk shadows and through the

glades of silver light; and I saw farther then into the most sacred

recesses of his soul than I have ever done before or since.

When we reached home the moon had already set; but some of her

beams seemed to have been left behind within my heart, so pure and

peaceful was the light which filled it.

The same feeling continued with me all through that evening. After

dinner some of the party played and sang. As it was Sunday, and

Lucy was rigid in her views, the music was of a sacred character.

I sat in a low armchair in a dark corner of the room, my mind too

dreamy to think, and too passive to dream. I hardly interchanged

three words with Alan, who remained in a still darker spot,

invisible and silent the whole time. Only as we left the room to

go to bed, I heard Lucy ask him if he had a headache. I did not

hear his answer, and before I could see his face he had turned back

again into the drawing-room.

V

It was early, and when first I got to my room I felt little

inclined for sleep. I wandered to the window, and drawing aside

the curtains, looked out upon the still, starlit sky. At least I

should rest quiet to-night. The air was very clear, and the sky

seemed full of stars. As I stood there scraps of schoolroom

learning came back to my mind. That the stars were all suns,

surrounded perhaps in their turn by worlds as large or larger than

our own. Worlds beyond worlds, and others farther still, which no

man might number or even descry. And about the distance of those

wonderful suns too,--that one, for instance, at which I was

looking,--what was it that I had been told? That our world was not

yet peopled, perhaps not yet formed, when the actual spot of light

which now struck my sight first started from the star's surface!

While it flashed along, itself the very symbol of speed, the whole

of mankind had had time to be born, and live, and die!

My gaze dropped, and fell upon the dim, half-seen outline of the

Dead Stone. That woman too. While that one ray speeded towards me

her life had been lived and ended, and her body had rotted away

into the ground. How close together we all were! Her life and

mine; our joys, sufferings, deaths--all crowded together into the

space of one flash of light! And yet there was nothing there but a

horrible skeleton of dead bones, while I--!

I stopped with a shudder, and turned back into the room. I wished

that Alan had not told me what lay under the stone; I wished that I

had never asked him. It was a ghastly thing to think about, and

spoilt all the beauty of the night to me.

I got quickly into bed, and soon dropped asleep. I do not know how

long I slept; but when I woke it was with the consciousness again

of that haunting wind.

It was worse than ever. The world seemed filled with its din.

Hurling itself passionately against the house, it gathered strength

with every gust, till it seemed as if the old walls must soon crash

in ruins round me. Gust upon gust; blow upon blow; swelling,

lessening, never ceasing. The noise surrounded me; it penetrated

my inmost being, as all-pervading as silence itself, and wrapping

me in a solitude even more complete. There was nothing left in the

world but the wind and I, and then a weird intangible doubt as to

my own identity seized me. The wind was real, the wind with its

echoes of passion and misery from the eternal abyss; but was there

anything else? What was, and what had been, the world of sense and

of knowledge, my own consciousness, my very self,--all seemed

gathered up and swept away in that one sole-existent fury of sound.

I pulled myself together, and getting out of bed, groped my way to

the table which stood between the bed and the fireplace. The

matches were there, and my half-burnt candle, which I lit. The

wind penetrating the rattling casement circled round the room, and

the flame of my candle bent and flared and shrank before it,

throwing strange moving lights and shadows in every corner. I

stood there shivering in my thin nightdress, half stunned by the

cataract of noise beating on the walls outside, and peered

anxiously around me. The room was not the same. Something was

changed. What was it? How the shadows leaped and fell, dancing in

time to the wind's music. Everything seemed alive. I turned my

head slowly to the left, and then to the right, and then round--and

stopped with a sudden gasp of fear.

The cabinet was open!

I looked away, and back, and again. There was no room for doubt.

The doors were thrown back, and were waving gently in the draught.

One of the lower drawers was pulled out, and in a sudden flare of

the candle-light I could see something glistening at its bottom.

Then the light dwindled again, the candle was almost out, and the

cabinet showed a dim black mass in the darkness. Up and down went

the flame, and each returning brightness flashed back at me from

the thing inside the drawer. I stood fascinated, my eyes fixed

upon the spot, waiting for the fitful glitter as it came and went.

What was there there? I knew that I must go and see, but I did not

want to. If only the cabinet would close again before I looked,

before I knew what was inside it. But it stood open, and the

glittering thing lay there, dragging me towards itself.

Slowly at last, and with infinite reluctance, I went. The drawer

was lined with soft white satin, and upon the satin lay a long,

slender knife, hilted and sheathed in antique silver, richly set

with jewels. I took it up and turned back to the table to examine

it. It was Italian in workmanship, and I knew that the carving and

chasing of the silver were more precious even than the jewels which

studded it, and whose rough setting gave so firm a grasp to my

hand. Was the blade as fair as the covering, I wondered? A little

resistance at first, and then the long thin steel slid easily out.

Sharp, and bright, and finely tempered it looked with its deadly,

tapering point. Stains, dull and irregular, crossed the fine

engraving on its surface and dimmed its polish. I bent to examine

them more closely, and as I did so a sudden stronger gust of wind

blew out the candle. I shuddered a little at the darkness and

looked up. But it did not matter: the curtain was still drawn away

from the window opposite my bedside, and through it a flood of

moonlight was pouring in upon floor and bed.

Putting the sheath down upon the table, I walked to the window to

examine the knife more closely by that pale light. How gloriously

brilliant it was! darkened now and again by the quickly passing

shadows of wind-driven clouds. At least so I thought, and I

glanced up and out of the window to see them. A black world met my

gaze. Neither moon was there nor moonlight: the broad silver beam

in which I stood stretched no farther than the window. I caught my

breath, and my limbs stiffened as I looked. No moon, no cloud, no

movement in the clear, calm, starlit sky; while still the ghastly

light stretched round me, and the spectral shadows drifted across

the room.

But it was not all dark outside: one spot caught my eye, bright

with a livid unearthly brightness--the Dead Stone shining out into

the night like an ember from hell's furnace! There was a horrid

semblance of life in the light,--a palpitating, breathing glow,--

and my pulses beat in time to it, till I seemed to be drawing it

into my veins. It had no warmth, and as it entered my blood my

heart grew colder, and my muscles more rigid. My fingers clutched

the dagger-hilt till its jeweled roughness pressed painfully into

my palm. All the strength of my strained powers seemed gathered in

that grasp, and the more tightly I held the more vividly did the

rock gleam and quiver with infernal life. The dead woman! The

dead woman! What had I to do with her? Let her bones rest in the

filth of their own decay,--out there under the accursed stone.

And now the noise of the wind lessens in my ears. Let it go on,--

yes, louder and wilder, drowning my senses in its tumult. What is

there with me in the room--the great empty room behind me?

Nothing; only the cabinet with its waving doors. They are waving

to and fro, to and fro--I know it. But there is no other life in

the room but that--no, no; no other life in the room but that.

Oh! don't let the wind stop. I can't hear anything while it goes

on;--but if it stops! Ah! the gusts grow weaker, struggling,

forced into rest. Now--now--they have ceased.

Silence!

A fearful pause.

What is that that I hear? There, behind me in the room?

Do I hear it? Is there anything?

The throbbing of my own blood in my ears.

No, no! There is something as well,--something outside myself.

What is it?

Low; heavy; regular.

God! it is--it is the breath of a living creature! A living

creature! here--close to me--alone with me!

The numbness of terror conquers me. I can neither stir nor speak.

Only my whole soul strains at my ears to listen.

Where does the sound come from?

Close behind me--close.

Ah-h!

It is from there--from the bed where I was lying a moment ago! . . .

I try to shriek, but the sound gurgles unuttered in my throat. I

clutch the stone mullions of the window, and press myself against

the panes. If I could but throw myself out!--anywhere, anywhere--

away from that dreadful sound--from that thing close behind me in

the bed! But I can do nothing. The wind has broken forth again

now; the storm crashes round me. And still through it all I hear

the ghastly breathing--even, low, scarcely audible--but I hear it.

I shall hear it as long as I live! . . .

Is the thing moving?

Is it coming nearer?

No, no; not that,--that was but a fancy to freeze me dead.

But to stand here, with that creature behind me, listening, waiting

for the warm horror of its breath to touch my neck! Ah! I cannot.

I will look. I will see it face to face. Better any agony than

this one.

Slowly, with held breath, and eyes aching in their stretched

fixity, I turn. There it is! Clear in the moonlight I see the

monstrous form within the bed,--the dark coverlet rises and falls

with its heaving breath. . . . Ah! heaven have mercy! Is there

none to help, none to save me from this awful presence? . . .

And the knife-hilt draws my fingers round it, while my flesh

quivers, and my soul grows sick with loathing. The wind howls, the

shadows chase through the room, hunting with fearful darkness more

fearful light; and I stand looking, . . . listening. . . .

. . . . . .

I must not stand here for ever; I must be up and doing. What a

noise the wind makes, and the rattling of the windows and the

doors. If he sleeps through this he will sleep through all.

Noiselessly my bare feet tread the carpet as I approach the bed;

noiselessly my left arm raises the heavy curtain. What does it

hide? Do I not know? The bestial features, half-hidden in coarse,

black growth; the muddy, blotched skin, oozing foulness at every

pore. Oh, I know them too well! What a monster it is! How the

rank breath gurgles through his throat in his drunken sleep. The

eyes are closed now, but I know them too; their odious leer, and

the venomous hatred with which they can glare at me from their

bloodshot setting. But the time has come at last. Never again

shall their passion insult me, or their fury degrade me in slavish

terror. There he lies; there at my mercy, the man who for fifteen

years has made God's light a shame to me, and His darkness a

terror. The end has come at last,--the only end possible, the only

end left me. On his head be the blood and the crime! God

almighty, I am not guilty! The end has come; I can bear my burden

no farther.

"Beareth all things, endureth all things."

Where have I heard those words? They are in the Bible; the precept

of charity. What has that to do with me? Nothing. I heard the

words in my dreams somewhere. A white-faced man said them, a

white-faced man with pure eyes. To me?--no, no, not to me; to a

girl it was--an ignorant, innocent girl, and she accepted them as

an eternal, unqualified law. Let her bear but half that I have

borne, let her endure but one-tenth of what I have endured, and

then if she dare let her speak in judgment against me.

Softly now; I must draw the heavy coverings away, and bare his

breast to the stroke,--the stroke that shall free me. I know well

where to plant it; I have learned that from the old lady's Italian.

Did he guess why I questioned him so closely of the surest,

straightest road to a man's heart? No matter, he cannot hinder me

now. Gently! Ah! I have disturbed him. He moves, mutters in his

sleep, throws out his arm. Down; down; crouching behind the

curtain. Heavens! if he wakes and sees me, he will kill me. No!

alas! if only he would. I would kiss the hand that he struck me

with; but he is too cruel for that. He will imagine some new and

more hellish torture to punish me with. But the knife! I have got

that; he shall never touch me living again. . . . He is quieter

now. I hear his breath, hoarse and heavy as a wild beast's

panting. He draws it more evenly, more deeply. The danger is

past. Thank God!

God! What have I to do with Him? A God of Judgment. Ha, ha!

Hell cannot frighten me; it will not be worse than earth. Only he

will be there too. Not with him, not with him,--send me to the

lowest circle of torment, but not with him. There, his breast is

bare now. Is the knife sharp? Yes; and the blade is strong

enough. Now let me strike--myself afterwards if need be, but him

first. Is it the devil that prompts me? Then the devil is my

friend, and the friend of the world. No. God is a God of love.

He cannot wish such a man to live. He made him, but the devil

spoilt him; and let the devil have his handiwork back again. It

has served him long enough here; and its last service shall be to

make me a murderess.

How the moonlight gleams from the blade as my arm swings up and

back: with how close a grasp the rough hilt draws my fingers round

it. Now.

A murderess?

Wait a moment. A moment may make me free; a moment may make me--

that!

Wait.

Hand and dagger droop again. His life has dragged its slime over

my soul; shall his death poison it with a fouler corruption still?

"My own soul's warden."

What was that? Dream memories again.

"Resist, strive, endure."

Easy words. What do they mean for me? To creep back now to bed by

his side, and to begin living again to-morrow the life which I have

lived to-day? No, no; I cannot do it. Heaven cannot ask it of me.

And there is no other way. That or this; this or that. Which

shall it be? Ah! I have striven, God knows. I have endured so

long that I hoped even to do so to the end. But to-day! Oh! the

torment and the outrage: body and soul still bear the stain of it.

I thought that my heart and my pride were dead together, but he has

stung them again into aching, shameful life. Yesterday I might

have spared him, to save my own cold soul from sin; but now it is

cold no longer. It burns, it burns and the fire must be slaked.

Ay, I will kill him, and have done with it. Why should I pause any

longer? The knife drags my hand back for the stroke. Only the

dream surrounds me; the pure man's face is there, white,

beseeching, and God's voice rings in my heart--

"To him that overcometh."

But I cannot overcome. Evil has governed my life, and evil is

stronger than I am. What shall I do? what shall I do? God, if

Thou art stronger than evil, fight for me.

"The victory of the Cross is ours."

Yes, I know it. It is true, it is true. But the knife? I cannot

loose the knife if I would. How to wrench it from my own hold?

Thou God of Victory be with me! Christ help me!

I seize the blade with my left hand; the two-edged steel slides

through my grasp; a sharp pain in fingers and palm; and then--

nothing. . . .

. . . . . .