But Dr. Zabriskie, who seemed to have an almost supernatural acuteness of hearing, gave a violent start at this, and spoke up for the first time with real passion in his voice:
“No, no, I pray you. I can bear anything but that. Remember, gentlemen, that I am blind; that I cannot see who is about me; that my life would be a torture if I felt myself surrounded by spies watching to catch some evidence of madness in me. Rather conviction at once, death, dishonour, and obloquy. These I have incurred. These I have brought upon myself by crime, but not this worse fate—oh! not this worse fate.”
His passion was so intense and yet so confined within the bounds of decorum, that we felt strangely impressed by it. Only the wife stood transfixed, with the dread growing in her heart, till her white, waxen visage seemed even more terrible to contemplate than his passion-distorted one.
“It is not strange that my wife thinks me demented,” the doctor continued, as if afraid of the silence that answered him. “But it is your business to discriminate, and you should know a sane man when you see him.”
Inspector D—— no longer hesitated.
“Very well,” said he, “give me the least proof that your assertions are true, and we will lay your case before the prosecuting attorney.”
“Proof? Is not a man’s word—”
“No man’s confession is worth much without some evidence to support it. In your case there is none. You cannot even produce the pistol with which you assert yourself to have committed the deed.”
“True, true. I was frightened by what I had done, and the instinct of self-preservation led me to rid myself of the weapon in any way I could. But someone found this pistol; someone picked it up from the sidewalk of Lafayette Place on that fatal night. Advertise for it. Offer a reward. I will give you the money.” Suddenly he appeared to realize how all this sounded. “Alas!” cried he, “I know the story seems improbable; but it is not the probable things that happen in this life, as, you should know, who every day dig deep into the heart of human affairs.”
Were these the ravings of insanity? I began to understand the wife’s terror.