"I have nothing to tell you," he stammered.
"That is not true," I replied firmly. "You are ill, mentally perhaps, and you dare not reveal your secret to anyone. Something or other is doing you harm, and I mean you to tell me what it is. Come, I am waiting for you to begin."
Again he got very red, stammered, and turning his head away, he said:
"It is very idiotic—but I—I am done for!"
As he did not go on, I said:
"Just tell me what it is."
"Well, I have got a wife who is killing me, that is all," he said abruptly, almost desperately.
I did not understand at first. "Does she make you unhappy? How? What is it?"
"No," he replied in a low voice, as if he were confessing some crime; "I love her too much, that is all."
I was thunderstruck at this brutal avowal, and then I felt inclined to laugh, but at length I managed to reply: