“I ought not to pursue the subject,” said his wife; “but, Ronald, there are times when it has a fascination for me. Why, my darling, does it hurt you so?”
He turned his face to her, haggard with the old lines of pain.
“I suffered so much, Hermione, when it happened that, rather than endure any more, I would die; I could not endure it.”
She bent over him and kissed him. “I wish,” she said, thoughtfully, “that we could persuade Kenelm to give up his mania. I cannot bear to think of his blighted life—so useless, so utterly without purpose. Suppose that, after the lapse of long years, he did succeed in bringing the criminal to light, what good would he do?”
“Secure justice,” he replied. “My belief is, Hermione, that if Kenelm Eyrle found the criminal to be his own mother he would not rest until he had brought her to the scaffold.”
“Oh, Ronald, that is a terrible thing to say; yet I believe it, love. As you say, with him the idea has long been a mania. On every other point, Kenelm Eyrle is a sane man, a loyal, honorable gentleman; on this subject he is mad, and I have always thought mischief would come of it.”
He would have changed the subject then, but it seemed to have a morbid fascination for him. Something had crept into the sunshine and stolen its beauty away; the sweetest fragrance had left the flowers, a sudden chill and blight had come over the lovely, glowing morning. It was with something like a shudder that Lady Hermione drew nearer to her husband and laid her beautiful head on his breast.
“Ronald,” she said, “I want to ask you something; do you believe that murder should be punished by death?”
“I do not know. Yes, I think I do. The Bible says so. A life for a life seems but just and fair.”
“Yet what good can it do?” she continued. “If anger, or madness, or vengeance leads one man to slay another, why hurry him from the world also? It seems to me two souls are imperiled then, instead of one; why not give him time to repent—a lifetime if need be, in which to repent and seek God’s pardon?”