On the third night she got up—finding herself alone—put on a dressing-gown and slippers, and staggered about the room; then she tottered out to contemplate the river.
Oh, how cool it looked! And she was burning—her veins ran fire. How delightful to slip into it, and thus end her life; she was useless now to herself—or any one. From her former existence she was separated by a great gulf; her new existence was intolerable. To her relations she was an encumbrance, and to her they were a nightmare.
She stole further and stared about her. There was the light in the office window; between it and her a stooping head. The recent rains had filled the Jurra to its brim. As it flowed past muttering to itself in the moonlight it looked most enticing. The river spirit seemed to whisper in her ear with seductive, rippling murmur:
"Come with me! Come with me!"
Only a little choking feeling and all would be over! Drowning, people said, was such an easy death. "Why wait?" urged the rippling river; in two minutes from this very time, she might be elsewhere, safely landed on the other shore. She must cross the River of Death sometime—why not now? It would not be wrong; on the contrary, it would be a blessed relief to every one, including herself. Oh, why should people speak of suicide with bated breath and horror?
"Oh, it is not wrong," she said aloud; "God knows all. He will forgive me. God pardon me and give me rest," she exclaimed, and raising her arms, she stepped down to the water's brink; suddenly a boat shot up close to the steps, a white figure rose before her, a firm, peremptory hand was laid on her wrist.
"Surely you would not bathe at this hour?" remonstrated a man's voice.
She drew a long, shuddering breath and moaned:
"Oh, let me go! Let me go!"
"Are you not afraid of the crocodiles?" he asked.