Confession

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"Edgerton does not appear to me to look so badly," I said to Julia,
after his departure for the evening.

"I don't know," she answered; "he looks very pale and miserable."

"Quite interesting!" I added, with a smile which might have been
a sneer.

"Painfully so. He can not last very long--his cough is very
troublesome."

"Indeed! I scarcely heard it. He is certainly a very fine-looking
fellow still, consumption or no consumption."

She was silent.

"A very graceful fellow: very generous and with accomplishments
such as are possessed by few. I have often envied him his person
and accomplishments."

"You!" she exclaimed, with something like an expression of incredulity.

"Yes!--that is to say, when I was a youth, and when I thought more
of commending myself to your eyes, than of anything besides."

"Ah!" she replied with an assuring smile, "you never needed qualities
other than your own to commend yourself to me."

"Pleasant hypocrite! And yet, Julia, would you not be better pleased
if I could draw and color, and talk landscape with you by the hour?"

"No! I have never thought of your doing anything of the kind."

"Like begets liking."

"It may be, but I do not think so. I do not think we love people
so much for what they can do, as for what they are."

"Ah, Julia, that is a great mistake. It is a law in morals, that
the qualities of men should depend upon their performances. What
a man is, results from what he does, and so we judge of persons.
Edgerton is a noble fellow; his tastes are very fine. I suspect he
can form as correct an opinion of a fine picture as any one--perhaps,
paint it as finely."

She was silent.

"Do you not think so, Julia?"

"I think he paints very well for an amateur."

"He is certainly a man of exquisite taste in most matters of taste
and elegance. I have always thought his manners particularly easy
and dignified. His carriage is at once manly and graceful; and his
dancing--do you not think he dances with admirable flexibility?"

"Really, Edward, I can scarcely regard dancing as a manly
accomplishment. It is necessary that a gentleman should dance,
perhaps, but it appears to me that he should do so simply because
it is necessary; and to pass through the measure without ostentation
or offence should be his simple object."

"These are not usually the opinions of ladies, Julia."

"They are mine, however."

"You are not sure. You will think otherwise to-morrow. At all
events, I think there can be little doubt that Edgerton is one of
the best dancers in the circle we have left; he has the happiest
taste in painting and poetry; and a more noble gentleman and true
friend does not exist anywhere. I know not to whom I could more
freely confide life, wealth, and honor, than to him."

She was silent. I fancied there was something like distress apparent
in her countenance. I continued:--

"There is one thing, Julia, about which I am not altogether
satisfied."

"Ah!" with much anxiety; "what is that?"

"I owe so much to his father, that, in his present condition, I
fancy we ought to receive him in our house. We should not let him
go among strangers, exposed to the noise and neglect of a hotel."

There was some abruptness in her answer:--

"I do not see how you can bring him here. You forget that we are mere
lodgers ourselves; indebted for our accommodation to the kindness
of a lady upon whom we should have no right to press other lodgers.
Such an arrangement would crowd the house, and make all parties
uncomfortable. Besides, I suppose Mr. Edgerton will scarcely
remain long enough in M---to make it of much importance where he
lodges, and when he finds the tavern uncomfortable he will take
his departure."

"But should he get sick at the tavern?"

"Such a chance would follow him wherever he went. That is the risk
which every man incurs when he goes abroad. He has a servant with
him--no doubt a favorite servant."

"Should he get sick, Julia, even a favorite servant will not be
enough. It will be our duty to make other provision for him. I owe
his father much; the old man evidently expects much from me by his
last letter. I owe the son much. He has been a true friend to me.
I must do for him as if he were a brother, and should he get sick,
Julia, you must be his nurse."

"Impossible, Mr. Clifford!" she replied, with unwonted energy,
while a deep, dark flush settled over her otherwise placid features,
which were now not merely discomposed but ruffled. "It is impossible
that I should be what you require. Suffer me, in this case, to
determine my duties for myself. Do for YOUR FRIEND what you think
proper. You can provide a nurse, and secure by money, the best
attendance in the town. I do not think that I can do better service
than a hundred others whom you may procure; and you will permit me
to say, without seeking to displease you, that I will not attempt
it."

I was not displeased at what she said, but it was not my policy
to admit this. With an air almost of indignation, I replied:

"And you would leave my friend to perish?"

"I trust he will not perish--I sincerely trust he will continue in
health while he remains here. I implore you, dear husband, to make
no requisition such as this. I can not serve your friend in this
capacity. I pray that he may not need it."

"But should he?"

"I can not serve him."

"Julia, you are a cold-hearted woman--you do not love me."

"Cold-hearted, Edward, cold-hearted? Not love you, Edward?--Oh,
surely, you can not mean it. No! no! you can not!"

She threw herself into my arms, clasped me fondly in hers, and the
warm tears from her eyes gushed into my bosom.

"Love me, love my dog--at least my friend!" I exclaimed, in austere
accents, but without repulsing her. I could not repulse her.
I had not strength to put her from me. The embrace was too dear;
and the energy with which she rejected a suggestion in which
I proposed only to try and test her, made her doubly dear at that
moment to my bosom. Alas! how, in the attempt to torture others,
do we torture ourselves! If I afflicted Julia in this scene, I
am very sure that my own sufferings were more intense. One thing
alone would have made them so. The ONE quality of evil, of the
bad spirit which mingled in with MY feelings, and did not trouble
HERS. But, just then I did not think her innocent altogether.
I still had my doubts that her resistance to my wishes was simply
meant to conceal that tendency in her own, the exposure of which
she had naturally every reason to dread. The demon of the blind
heart, though baffled for awhile, was still busy. Alas! he was not
always to be baffled.

CHAPTER XLII.

CROSS PURPOSES.

Weeks passed and still William Edgerton was a resident of M---,
and a constant guest at our little cottage. He had, in this time,
effectually broken up the harmony and banished the peace which
had previously prevailed there. The unhappy young man pursued the
same insane course of conduct which had been productive of so much
bitterness and trouble to us all before; and, under the influence
of my evil demon, I adopted the same blind policy which had already
been so fruitful of misery to myself and wife. I gave them constant
opportunities together. I found my associates, and pursued my
pastimes--pastimes indeed--away from home. Poetry and song were
given up--we no longer wandered by the river-side, and upon the
green heights of our sacred hill. My evenings were consumed in dreary
rambles, alone with my own evil thoughts, and miserable fancies,
or consumed with yellow-eyed watching, from porch or tree, upon
those privacies of the suspected lovers, in which I had so shamefully
indulged before. I felt the baseness of this vocation, but I had
not the strength to give it up. I know there is no extenuation for
it. I know that it was base! base! base! It is a point of conscience
with me, not only to declare the truth, but to call things by the
truest and most characteristic names. Let me do my understanding
the justice to say that, even when I practised the meanness, I was
not ignorant--not insensible of its character. It was the strength
only--the courage to do right, and to forbear the wrong--in which
I was deficient. It was the blind heart, not the unknowing head to
which the shame was attributable, though the pang fell not unequally
upon heart and head.

Meanwhile, Kingsley returned from Texas. He became my principal
companion. We strolled together in my leisure hours by day. We sat
and smoked together in his chamber by night. My blind fortitude
may be estimated, when the reader is told that Kingsley professed
to find me a very agreeable companion. He complimented me on my
liveliness, my wit, my humor, and what not--and this, too, when I
was all the while meditating, with the acutest feeling of apprehension,
upon the very last wrong which the spirit of man is found willing
to endure;--when I believed that the ruin of my house was at hand;
when I believed that the ruin of my heart and hope had already taken
place;--and when, hungering only for the necessary degree of proof
which justice required before conviction, I was laying my gins and
snares with the view to detecting the offenders, and consummating
the last terrible but necessary work of vengeance! But Kingsley
did not confine himself altogether to the language of compliment.

"Good fellow and good companion as you are, Clifford--and loath as
I should be to give up these pleasant evenings, still I think you
very wrong in one respect. You neglect your wife."

"Ha! ha! what an idea! You are not serious?"

"As a judge."

"Psha! She does not miss me."

"Perhaps not," he answered gravely--"but for your own sake if not
for hers, it seems to me you should pursue a more domestic course."

"What mean you?"

"Yon leave your wife too much to herself!--nay--let me be frank--not
too much to herself, for there would be little danger in that, but
too much with that fellow Edgerton."

"What? You would not have me jealous, Kingsley?"

"No! Only prudent."

"You dislike Edgerton, Kingsley."

"I do! I frankly confess it. I think he wants manliness of character,
and such a man always lacks sincerity. But I do not speak of him.
I should utter the same opinion with respect to any other man, in
similar circumstances. A wife is a dependent creature--apt to be
weak!--If young, she is susceptible--equally susceptible to the
attentions of another and to the neglect of her husband. I do not
say that such is the case--with your wife. Far from it. I esteem
her very much as a remarkable woman. But women were intended to
be dependents. Most of them are governed by sensibilities rather
than by principles. Impulse leads them and misleads. The wife
finds herself neglected by the very man who, in particular, owes
her duty. She finds herself entertained, served, watched, tended
with sleepless solicitude, by another; one, not wanting either in
personal charms and accomplishments, and having similar tastes and
talents. What should be the result of this? Will she not become
indifferent where she finds indifference--devoted where she
finds devotion? A cunning fellow, like Edgerton, may, under these
circumstances, rob a man of his wife's affections. Mark me, I do
not say that he will do anything positively dishonorable, at least
in the world's acceptation of the term. I do not intimate--I would
not willingly believe--that she would submit to anything of the
sort. I speak of the affections, not of the virtues. There is shame
to the man in his wife's dishonor; but the misfortune of losing
her affections is neither more nor less than the suffering without
the shame. Look to it. I do not wish to prejudice your mind against
Edgerton. Far from it. I have forborne to speak hitherto because
I knew that my own mind was prejudiced against him. Even now I
say nothing against HIM. What I say has reference to your conduct
only.--I do not think Edgerton a bad man. I think him a weak
one. Weak as a woman--governed, like her, by impulse rather than
by principle--easily led away--incapable of resisting where his
affections are concerned--repenting soon, and sinning, in the same
way, as fast as he repents. He is weak, very weak--washy-weak--he
wants stamina, and, wanting that, wants principle!"

"Strange enough, if you should be right! How do you reconcile this
opinion with his refusal to lend you money to game upon? He was
governed in that by principle."

"Not a bit of it! He was governed by habit. He knew nothing
of gambling--had heard his father always preaching against it--it
was not a temptation with him. His tastes were of another sort. He
could not be tried in that way. The very fact that he was susceptible,
in particular, to the charms of female society, saved him from
the passion for gaming, as it would save him from the passion for
drink. But the very tastes that saved him from one passion make him
particularly susceptible to another. He can stand the temptation of
play, but not that of women. Let him be tried THERE, and he falls!
his principle would not save him--would not be worth a straw to a
drowning man."

"You underrate--undervalue Edgerton. He has always been a true,
generous friend of mine."

"Be it so! with that I have nothing to do. But friendship has its
limits which it can not pass. Were Edgerton truly your friend, he
would advise you as I have done. Nay, a proper sense of friendship
and of delicacy would have kept him from paying that degree of
attention to the wife which must be an hourly commentary on the
neglect of her husband. I confess to you it was this very fact that
made me resolve to speak to you."

"I thank you, my dear fellow, but I have nothing to fear. Poor
Edgerton is dying--music and painting are his solace--they minister
to his most active tastes. As for Julia, she is immaculate."

"I distrust neither; but you should not throw away your pearl,
because you think it can not suffer stain."

"I do not throw it away."

"You do not sufficiently cherish it."

"What would you have me do--wear it constantly in my bosom?"

"No! not exactly that; but at least wear nothing else there so
frequently or so closely as that."

"I do not. I fancy I am a very good husband. You shall not put me
out of humor, Kingsley, either with my wife or myself. You shall
not make me jealous. I am no Othello--I have no visitations of the
moon."

And I laughed--laughed while speaking thus--though the keen pang
was writhing at that moment like a burning arrow through my brain.

"I have no wish to make you jealous, Clifford, and I very much
admire your superiority and strength. I congratulate you on your
singular freedom from this unhappy passion. But you may become too
confident. You may lose your wife's affections by your neglect,
when you might not lose them by treachery."

"You are grown a croaker, Kingsley, and I will leave you. I will
go home. I will show you what a good husband I am, or can become."

"That's right; but smoke another cigar before you go."

"There it is!" I exclaimed, laughingly. "You blow hot and cold.
You would have me go and stay."

"Take the cigar, at least, and smoke it as you go. My advice is
good, and that it is honest you may infer from my reluctance to
part with you. I will see you at the office at nine in the morning.
There is some prospect of a compromise with Jeffords about the tract
in Dallas, and he is to meet Wharton and myself at your law-shop
to-morrow. It is important to make an arrangement with Jeffords--his
example will be felt by Brownsell and Gibbon. We may escape a
long-winded lawsuit, after all, to your great discomfiture and my
gain. But you do not hear me!"

"Yes, yes, every word--you spoke of Jeffords, and Wharton, and
Gibbon--yes, I heard you."

"Now I know that you did not hear me--not understandingly, at
least. I should not be surprised if I have made you jealous. You
look wild, mon ami!"

"Jealous, indeed! what nonsense!" and I prepared to depart when
I had thus spoken.

"Well, at nine you must meet us at the office. My business must
not suffer because you are jealous."

"Come, no more of that, Kingsley!"

"By heavens, you are touched."

He laughed merrily. I laughed also, but with a choking effort
which almost cost me a convulsion as I left the tavern. The sport
of Kingsley was my death. What he had said previously sunk deep
into my soul. Not rightly--not as it should have sunk--showing me
the folly of my own course without assuming, as I did, the inevitable
wilfulness of the course of others; but actually confirming me in
my fears--nay, making them grow hideous as THINGS and substantive
convictions. It seemed to me, from what Kingsley said that I was
already dishonored--that the world already knew my shame; and that
he, as my friend, had only employed an ambiguous language to soften
the sting and the shock which his revelations must necessarily
occasion. With this new notion, which occurred to me after leaving
the house, I instantly returned to it. It required a strong effort
to seem deliberate in what I spoke.

"Kingsley," I said, "perhaps I did not pay sufficient heed to your
observations. Do you mean to convey to my mind the idea that people
think Edgerton too familiar with my wife? Do you mean to say that
such a notion is abroad? That there is anything wrong?"

"By no means."

"Ah! then there is nothing in it. I see no reason for suspicion.
I am not a jealous man; but it becomes necessary when one's neighbors
find occasion to look into one's business, to look a little into
it one's self."

"One must not wait for that," said Kingsley; "but where is your
cigar?"

The question confused me. I had dropped it in the agitation of my
feelings, without being conscious of its loss.

"Take another," said he, with a smile, "and let your cares end in
smoke as you wend homeward. My most profound thoughts come from
my cigar. To that I look for my philosophy, my friendship, my
love--almost my religion. A cigar is a brain-comforter, verily.
You should smoke more, Clifford. You will grow better, wiser--COOLER."

"I take your cigar and counsel together," was my reply. "The one
shall reconcile me to the other. Bon repos!" And so I left him.

I was not likely to have bon repos myself. I was troubled. Kingsley
suspects me of being jealous. Such an idea was very mortifying.
This is another weakness of the suspicious nature. It loathes
above all things to be suspected of jealousy. I hurried home,
vexed with my want of coolness--doubly vexed at the belief that
other eyes than my own were witnesses of the attentions of Edgerton
to my wife.

I stopped at the entrance of our cottage. HE was there as usual.
Mrs. Porterfield was not present. The candle was burning dimly. He
sat upon the sofa. Julia was seated upon chair at a little distance.
Her features wore an expression of exceeding gravity. His were pale
and sad, but his eyes burnt with an eager intensity that betrayed
the passionate feeling in his heart. Thus they sat--she looking
partly upon the floor--he looking at her. I observed them for
more than ten minutes; and in all that time I do not believe they
exchanged two sentences.

"Surely," I thought, "this must be a singularly sufficing passion
which can enjoy itself in this manner without the help of language."

Of course, this reflection increased the strength of my suspicions.
I became impatient, and entered the cottage. The eyes of Julia
seemed to brighten at my appearance, but they were aiso full of
sadness. Edgerton soon after rose and took his departure. I believe,
if I had stayed away till midnight, he would have lingered until
that time; but I also believe that if I had returned two hours
before, he would have gone as soon. His passion for the wife seemed
to produce an antipathy to the husband, quite as naturally as that
which grew up in my bosom in regard to him. When he was gone, my
wife approached me, almost vehemently exclaiming--

"Why, why do you leave me thus, Clifford? Surely you can not love
me."

"Indeed I do; but I was with Kingsley. I had business, and did not
suppose you would miss me."

"Why suppose otherwise, Edward? I do miss you. I beg that you will
not leave me thus again."

"What do you mean? You are singularly earnest, Julia. What has
happened? What has offended you? Was not Edgerton with you all the
evening?"

My questions, coupled with my manner, which has been somewhat
excited, seemed to alarm her. She replied hurriedly:--

"Nothing has happened! nothing has offended me! But I feel that
you should not leave me thus. It does not look well. It looks as
if you did not love me."

"Ah! but when you KNOW that I do!"

"I do not know it. Oh, show me that you do, Edward. Stay with me
as you did at first--when we first came here--when we were first
married. Then we were so--so happy!"

"You would not say that you are not happy now?"

"I am not! I do not see you as I wish--when I wish! You leave
me so often--leave me to strangers, and seem so indifferent. Oh!
Edward, do not let me think that you care for me no longer."

"Strangers! Why, how you talk!--Good old Mrs. Porterfield seems
to me like my own grandmother, and Edgerton has been my friend---"

Did I really hear her say the single word, "Friend!" and with such
an accent! The sound was a very slight one--it may have been my
fancy only;--and she turned away a moment after. What could it mean?
I was bewildered. I followed her to the chamber. I endeavored to
renew the subject in such a manner as not to offend her suspicions,
but she seemed to have taken the alarm. She answered me in monosyllables
only, and without satisfying the curiosity which that single word,
doubtfully uttered, had so singularly awakened.

"Only love me--love me, Edward, and keep with me, and I will not
complain. But if you leave me--if you neglect me--I am desolate!"

CHAPTER XLIII.

ACCIDENT AND MORE AGONIES.

There was something very unaccountable in all this. I say unaccountable,
with the distinct understanding that it was unaccountable only to
that obtuse condition of mind which is produced by the demon of
the blind heart. My difficulties of judging were only temporary,
however. The sinister spirit made his whisper conclusive in the
end.

"This vehemence," it suggested, "which is so unwonted with her, is
evidently unnatural, It--is affected for an object. What is that
object? It is the ordinary one with persons in the wrong, who always
affect one extreme of feeling when they would conceal another. She
fears that you will suspect that she is very well satisfied in
your absence; accordingly she strives to convince you that she was
never so dissatisfied. Of course you can not believe that a man
so well endowed as Edgerton, so graceful, having such fine tastes
and accomplishments, can prove other than an agreeable companion!
What then should be your belief?"

There was a devilish ingenuity in this sort of perversion. It had its
effect. I believed it; and believing it, revolted, with a feeling
of hate and horror, at the supposed loathsome hypocrisy of that
fond embrace, and those earnest pleadings, which, in the moment
of their first display, had seemed so precious to my soul. In the
morning, when I was setting forth from home, she put her arm on my
shoulder:--

"Come home soon. Edward, and let us go together on the hill. Let
nobody know. Surely we shall be company enough for each other. I
will sketch you a view of the river while you read Wordsworth to
me."

"Now," whispered my demon in my ears, "that is ingenious. Let nobody
know; as if, having a friend in the neighborhood--on a visit--he
sick and in bad spirits--you should propose to yourself a pleasure
trip of any kind without inviting him to partake of it? She knows
THAT to be out of the question, and that you must ask Edgerton if
you resolve to go yourself."

Such was the artful suggestion of my familiar. My resolve--still
recognising the cruel policy by which I had been so long governed--was
instantly taken. This was to invite Edgerton and Kingsley both.

"I will give them every opportunity. While Kingsley and myself ramble
together, well leave this devoted pair to their own cogitations,
taking care, however, to see what comes of them."

I promised Julia to be home in season, but said nothing of
my intention to ask the gentlemen. She thanked me with a look and
smile, which, had I not seen all things through eyes of the most
jaundiced green, would have seemed to me that of an angel, expressive
only of the truest love.

"Ah! could I but believe!" was the bitter self-murmur of my soul,
as I left the threshold.

On my way through the town I stopped at the postoffice to get
letters, and received one from Mrs. Delaney--late Clifford--my
wife's exemplary mother, addressed to Julia. I then proceeded to
Edgerton's lodgings. He was not yet up, and I saw him in his chamber.
His flute lay upon the toilet. Seeing it, I recalled, with all its
original vexing bitterness, the scene which took place the night
previous to my departure from my late home. And when I looked on
Edgerton--saw with what effort he spoke, and how timidly he expressed
himself--how reluctant were his eyes to meet the gaze of mine--his
guilt seemed equally fresh and unequivocal. I marked him out,
involuntarily, as my victim. I felt assured, even while conveying
to him the complimentary invitation which I bore, that my hand
was commissioned to do the work of death upon his limbs. Strange
and fascinating conviction! But I did not contemplate this necessity
with any pleasure. No! I would have prayed--I did pray--that the
task might be spared me. If I thought of it at all, it was as the
agent of a necessity which I could not countervail. The fates had
me in their keeping. I was the blind instrument obeying the inflexible
will, against which

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