"How could you think that? You are clear in your mind that you never touched the dagger."
"Yes, but I touched the hand that held the dagger."
Larmer looked at his friend and client in a dubious way, as though he could not feel quite sure of his sanity.
"My dear Walcott," he said, "you are out of tune—upset by all this miserable business; and no wonder. You say you touched the hand that held the dagger that stabbed the woman. We know you did; what then? What moved the fingers that touched the hand that held the dagger, etcetera? Was it a good motive or a bad motive, tell me!"
"That is just what I can't tell you, for I don't know. Perhaps it was an instinct of self-defence; but I have no recollection of being afraid that she would stab me. I had a confused notion that she was going to stab herself; perhaps, I only got as far as thinking that the bodkin would be better out of her hand."
"This is a touch of your old subtlety. I do believe you could work yourself up to thinking that you actually wanted to hurt her!"
"Subtlety or no subtlety, these impressions are very acute in my own mind. I can see the whole of that scene as plainly as I see you at this moment. It comes before my eyes in a series of pictures, vivid and complete in every twist and turn; only the motives that guided me are blurred and confused. I grasped her wrist, and she struggled frantically to shake me off. Our faces were close together, and there was a horrible fascination in her eyes—the eyes of a madwoman at that moment, beyond all question."
"I am convinced that she is mad, and has been so for years," said Mr. Larmer, positively.
"She was mad then, foaming at the mouth, and trying to bite me in her impotent fury. I could not hold her wrist firmly—she plunged here and there so violently that one or other of us was pretty sure to be hurt, unless I could force her to drop the murderous weapon. I was ashamed that I could not do it; but she had the strength of a demon, and I really wonder that she did not master me. Then the end came. Suddenly her resistance ceased. The desperate force with which I had been holding her hand must have been fully exerted at the very instant when her muscles relaxed—when the light went out of her eyes and the body staggered to the ground. It all happened at once. Did she faint? At any rate, my fingers never touched the dagger until after she was stabbed."
"It was a pure accident—as clear as can be; and the whole blame of it is on her own shoulders. She brought the weapon, she held it, she resisted you when you tried to prevent mischief. She, not you, had the disposition to injure, and you have not an atom of responsibility."