"Coward! No! Do I not tell you shoot? I do not fear death. Nay,

let me say to you, Clifford, I long for it. Life has been a long

torture to me--is still a torture. It can not now be otherwise.

Take it--you will see me smile in the death agony."

"Hear me William Edgerton, and submit to my will. You know not

half your wrong. You drove me from my home--my birthplace. When I

was about to sacrifice you for your previous invasion of my peace

in C--, I looked on your old father, I heard the story of his

disappointment--his sorrows--and you were the cause. I determined

to spare you--to banish myself rather, in order to avoid the

necessity of taking your life. You were not satisfied with having

wrought this result. You have pursued me to the woods, where my

cottage once more began to blossom with the fruits of peace and

love. You trample upon its peace--you renew your indignities and

perfidies here. You drive me to desperation and fill my habitation

with disgrace. Will you deny me then what I ask? Will you refuse

me the atonement--any atonement--which I may demand?"

"No, Clifford!" he replied, after a pause in which he seemed subdued

with shame and remorse. "You shall have it as you wish. I will fight

you. I am all that you declare. I am guilty of the wrong you urge

against me. I knew not, till now, that I had been the cause of your

flight from C--. Had I known that!"

Kingsley offered him the pistol.

"No!" he said, putting it aside. "Not now! I will give you this

atonement this afternoon. At this moment I can not. I must write.

I must make another atonement. Your claim for justice, Clifford,

must not preclude my settlement of the claims of others."

"Mine must have preference!"

"It shall! The atonement which I propose to make shall be, one of

repentance. You would not deny me the melancholy privilege of saying

a few last words to my wretched parents?"

"No! no! no!"

"I thank you, Clifford. Come for me at four to my lodgings--bring

Mr. Kingsley with you. You will find me ready to atone, and to save

you every unnecessary pang in doing so."

This ended our conference. Kingsley rode home with him, while,

throwing myself upon the ground, I surrendered myself to such

meditations as were natural to the moods which governed me. They

were dark and dismal enough. Edgerton had avowed his guilt. Could

there be any doubt on the subject of my wife's? He had made no

sort of qualification in his avowal of guilt, which might acquit

her. He had evidently made his confession with the belief that

I was already in possession of the whole truth. One hope alone

remained--that my wife's voluntary declaration would still be

forthcoming. To that I clung as the drowning man to his last plank.

When Kingsley and Edgerton first left me, I had resolved to waste

the hours in the woods and not to return home until after my final

meeting in the afternoon with the latter. It might be that I should

not return home then, and in such an event I was not unwilling that

my wife should still live, the miserable thing which she had made

herself. But, with the still fond hope that she might speak, and

speak in season, I now resolved to return at the usual dinner hour;

and, timing myself accordingly, I prolonged my wanderings through

the woods until noon. I then set forward, and reached the cottage

a little sooner than I had expected.




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