This statement, which is as accurate as I can make it, except in the case of those voluntary omissions which I believe you yourself would have desired, I here seal up, to be delivered to you with those other letters in case I should die while you are still Theodora Johnston.
I have also made my will, leaving you all my effects, and appointing you my sole executrix; putting you, in short, in exactly the same position as if you had been my wife. This is best, in order that by no chance should the secret ooze out through any guesses of any person not connected with your family; also because I think it is what you would wish yourself. You said truly, I have only you.
Another word, which I do not name in my ordinary letters, lest I might grieve you by what may prove to be only a fancy of mine.
Sometimes, in the hard work of this my life here, I begin to feel that I am no longer a young man, and that the reaction after the great strain, mental and bodily, of the last few months, has left me not so strong as I used to be. Not that I think I am about to die, far from it. I have a good constitution, which has worn well yet, and may wear on for some time, though not for ever, and I am nearly fifteen years older than you.
It is very possible that before any change can come, I may leave you, never a wife, and yet a widow. Possible, among the numerous fatalities of life, that we may never be married—never even see one another again.
Sometimes, when I see two young people married and happy, taking it all as a matter of course, scarcely even recognising it as happiness—-just like Mr. and Mrs. Treherne, who hunted me out lately, and insisted on my visiting them—I think of you and me, and it seems very bitter, and I look on the future with less faith than fear. It might not be so if I could see you now and then—but oftentimes this absence feels like death.
Theodora, if I should die before we are married, without any chance of writing down my last words, take them here.
No, they will not come. I can but crush my lips upon this paper—only thy name, not thee, and call thee “my love, my love!” Remember, I loved thee—all my soul was full of the love of thee. It made life happy, earth beautiful, and Heaven nearer. It was with me day and night, in work or rest—as much a part of me as the hand I write with, or the breath I draw. I never thought of myself, but of “us.” I never prayed but I prayed for two. Love, my love, so many miles away—O my God, why not grant me a little happiness before I die!
Yet, as once I wrote before, and as she says always in all things, Thy will be done.