His eye, which was fixed on the prostrate body of his bride, did not yield up its secret. When he moved and came to where she lay and caught his first sight of the ribbon and the pistol attached to it, the most experienced among us were baffled as to the nature of his feelings and thoughts. One thing alone was patent to all. He had no wish to touch this woman whom he had so lately sworn to cherish. His eyes devoured her, he shuddered and strove several times to speak, and though kneeling by her side, he did not reach forth his hand nor did he let a tear fall on the appealing features so pathetically turned upward as if to meet his look.
Suddenly he leaped to his feet.
“Must she stay here?” he demanded, looking about for the person most in authority.
The captain answered by a question:
“How do you account for her being here at all? What explanation have you, as her husband, to give for this strange suicide of your wife?”
For reply, Mr. Jeffrey, who was an exceptionally handsome man, drew forth a small slip of crumpled paper, which he immediately handed over to the speaker.
“Let her own words explain,” said he. “I found this scrap of writing in our upstairs room when I returned home tonight. She must have written it just before—before—”
A smothered groan filled up the break, but it did not come from his lips, which were fixed and set, but from those of the woman who crouched amongst us. Did he catch this expression of sorrow from one whose presence he as yet had given no token of recognizing? He did not seem to. His eye was on the captain, who was slowly reading, by the light of a lantern held in a detective’s hand, the almost illegible words which Mr. Jeffrey had just said were his wife’s last communication.
Will they seem as pathetic to the eye as they did to the ear in that room of awesome memories and present death?
“I find that I do not love you as I thought I did. I can not live, knowing this to be so. I pray God that you may forgive me.