CHAPTER XIX
TOWARDS RUTH'S GRAVE
But if you look into it, the balance is perfectly adjusted, even here. God has made His world much better than you and I could make it. Everything reaps its own harvest; every act has its own reward. And before you covet the enjoyment which another possesses, you must first calculate the cost at which it was procured.—FREDERICK W. ROBERTSON.
Morton Hall was about thirty-five miles from Trewinion, in a south-easterly direction. It lay on the opposite side of the county, and the country between was hilly, but fertile. I did not know the road well, but I knew it well enough for my purpose. By travelling at the rate of four miles an hour I could reach the Hall in nine hours. I could give no reason for going thither except that I was drawn by an irresistible power, a power by means of which I hoped to quench the awful fires in my soul.
The night was clear, and the stars shone brightly overhead. These I had studied through the long years of my seafaring life and so knew their location well. Fixing on one which lay in the direction in which I desired to go, I followed it as my guide.
To analyse the feelings that possessed me that night would be impossible. One hears sometimes of a murderer "escaping." That may never be. The officers of the law may not suspect him, the hangman's rope may never come near him, but no murderer escapes. He never escapes the terrible undefinable fear which constantly dogs him, the ghastly gnawing which eats at his heart.
At every step I saw my brother Wilfred. I constantly heard his voice, and every footfall spoke of what I had done. The hedges were full of grinning devils, which mocked me, while the stars that spangled the sky spelt the word that was dragging me deeper into hell.
Time after time I tried to comfort myself with the thought that I did not intentionally kill him, that it was an accident which caused him to fall upon those cruel rocks hundreds of feet below, but I found no comfort in the thought. I could not get rid of the fact that I hated my brother, and that whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer. Even had I not done the deed, even had Wilfred been alive, I was still a murderer at heart. I had hated him alive, I hated him still, and even now I had no sorrow at what I had done.
On, on I went, wildly yet wearily; tired I was, but I never rested, nor abated my speed, and ever as I went ghastly thoughts tormented me. Now I pictured him lying bruised and bleeding among the rocks, alive yet helpless; and as he lay I saw the tide rising all around him, and laughing at his cries for help. Then I saw him a ghastly, mis-shapen mass, crushed and battered beyond all recognition, with eyes red as blood and bursting from their sockets. Again I saw him, and the scene was more terrible still. He was entering a great gulf which I knew to be the mouth of hell, and as he went I saw that he was attended by ghastly, pallid creatures, who were cold and clammy in spite of the fires that burned in their breasts.