The billet which was addressed to my wife was in the following
language:"Lady, on the verge of the grave, having sincerely repented of the
offense I have given you, I implore you to pity and to pardon. A
sense of guilt and shame weighs me down to earth. You can not apply
a harsher judgment to my conduct than I feel it deserves; but I am
crushed already. You will not trample the prostrate. In a few hours
my body will be buried in the dust. My soul is already there. But,
though writhing, I do not curse; and still loving, I yet repent.
In my last moments I implore you to forgive! forgive! forgive!"
This was all, and I considered the two documents with keen and
conflicting feelings. There was an earnestness--a sincerity about
them, which I could not altogether discredit. He had freely avowed
his own errors; but he had not spoken for hers. I did not dare
to admit the impression which he evidently wished to convey of
her entire innocence, not only from the practices, but the very
thoughts of guilt. It is in compliance with a point of honor that
the professed libertine yet endeavors to excuse and save the partner
of his wantonness. In this light I regarded all those parts of
his narrative which went to extenuate her conduct. There was one
part of her conduct, indeed, which, as it exceeded his ability to
account for, was beyond his ability to excuse--namely, her strange
concealment of his insolence. This was the grand fault which, it
appeared to me, was conclusive of all the rest. It was now my policy
to believe in this fault wholly. If I did not, where was I? what
was my condition?--my misery?
I sat brooding, with these documents open before me on the table,
when Kingsley tapped at the door. I bade him enter, and put the
papers in his hands. He read them in silence, laid them down without
a word, and looked me with a grave composure in the face.
"What do you think of it?" I demanded.
"That he speaks the truth," he replied.
"Yes, no doubt--so far as he himself is concerned."
"I should think it all true."
"Indeed! I think not."
"Why do you doubt, and what?"
"I doubt those portions in which he insists upon my wife's integrity."
"Wherefore?"
"There are many reasons; the principal of which is her singular
concealment of the truth. She suffers a strange man to offend her
virtue with the most atrocious familiarities, and says nothing to
her husband, who, alone, could have redressed the wrong and remedied
the impertinence."
"That certainly is a staggering fact."
"According to his own admission, she warns him to fly from the wrath
of her husband, to which his audacity had exposed him--warns him,
in her night-dress, and from the window of her chamber."