Year: 1875

me. | got into his family, and toadiet


them, and made myself their servant
only TO hear of him, and to feel nearel
| him, and be where he had been-I Low,
| him sol | love no one else in til,


world never did. l would Kill yOu
and a dozen like you. TO save him from


fingerache. | would rather thou.
sand times have blow from him thar
n kiss from yOu--a hundred million
timesi When think of him, and that


you are between us, hate you'll abhOl


You. How dare you smile ut me? III
kill vou.r


81 was quite unconscious of smiling


but she darted at me and struck at nay
throat. j caught her hand this time
she had a penknife in it, and felt that
she had pricked me. That instructive
act of self defence reused me, and
probably saved my wits as well as my
life. When | had mastered her, and


thrown the knife away, | held her hands


in mine till she put down her face and


bit them savagely. | tied her wrists


with my pocket handkerchief, and she


sank painting on a chair. All of a
sudden the unhappy creature burst out
crying as if her heart was broken--as il
well might be. Probably RingwoOd's
cool treatment of her throughout the
interview recently passed was at the
bottom of that frenzy of vitupeIation,
that desperate behavior toward me.
She did not hate me, but was simply
mad with pain, and raved and struck
out in her delirium. | think she really
liked me when she married me, not
wlthstanding her assertion TO the con-
trary, and meant and wished to lead a
new life; but the sight of Rngwood' :
name in the papers, and the knowledge
of his nearness, in my absence. revived
her passion for him, IN which her good
resolutions burnt like straw. | re-
leased her hands, and brought water
and put 1t to her lips; and when she
was quiet through exhaustion, | adj
vised her to lie down, and hoped she
would go to sleep. As was leaving
the room. She called me back, IN a low
broken voice, and when | stood beside
the sofa on which she lay, she joined
her hands, and asked me, with stream
ing eyes, to forgive her. | did So
freely. OF course Ringwood was right.
] had no one but myself to thank. My
infatuation had been so monstrous that
| could no more complain of the con-
sequences than man, sober, can com
PLAIN of the consequences of some
drunken folly.


In the morning took Fanny away to
farmhouse IN Kent, a place she knew
of, and chose herself for a retreat. She
was quiet and humble, and apparently
brokeH-spirited. But she did not re-
main there month nor do | know
whittier she went, or where she has
been ever since. Before she left she
wrote me long letter expressing her
remOrSe at her behavior toward me !:
bad as | am ended she, 81 will never
trouble yOu more. do implore you to
be sure of that, and to forget me, or
think of me as dead"


am afraid to think of her at all. |
! made every possible effort to trace
her, quite in vain; and / hardly know
where would be the good if ! succeeded.


That's all,n added tTrquchart, after
a moments pause land there's the
history of Your friend and the wife of
his bosom; and II you still wonder how
or when my devil got into me, don't.
| believe you love me enough to think
he is not so black a devil rs he is
painted. | am not the kind of man in
whose heart such a cash could be made
and heal, and leave 30 mark. For a
long while this world seemed, and often
does seem. really an inferno; nothing
but plunging and breaking ones heart
in swamp of suffering, with intervals
of quiet from mere exhaustion and
despOir.. q Charley, how | wished
your mother had been alIvel | wanted
some kind woman, that was honest and
pure, about me: we men all do IN our
dark hour. BaStd let us 90 down to
the drawing room, and our friends, and
the lamp. by .Iove what Il flash
There's a mighty storm brewing, young
fellow