My mental attitude was quite altruistic. Could I have undone the past, I would cheerfully have undergone a painful and protracted death forthwith.
But no possible atonement on my part would restore Alice to life. I knew it was quite improbable that I should be convicted of murdering her, strong as the circumstantial testimony against me must be. The mere legal consequences did not, however, weigh with me for a second. From that awful hour I felt that I was doomed personally. My only thought was to seek oblivion, not only for myself, but for all whom Alice’s death might affect.
Reasoning in this way, I rapidly resolved to make a bold effort to conceal forever the time and place of the fatality. If I failed, I could tell the truth; if I succeeded, I might, at my own expense, save a vast amount of unnecessary sorrow.
The desperate expedient came to me of carrying off the body to the untenanted house at Putney where my old master had resided until his death, utilizing the four-wheeled cab with its half-drunken driver for the purpose.
If I reached Putney unhindered, I could dispose of my terrible burden easily, for the river flowed past the grounds, and every inch of the locality was known to me.
It occurred to me that perhaps the body might be found and recognized. Our personal linen was never marked, by reason of the fact that our laundry work was done upon our Yorkshire estate, but as a temporary safeguard I resolved to take some different and less valuable outer clothes from Mrs. Hillmer’s residence.
Her maid was of a similar build to my wife, so I hastened to the girl’s room, and laid hands upon a soiled coat and skirt which were relegated to the recesses of the wardrobe.
I glanced at my watch as I came along the corridor. It was 6.15 P.M. All the incidents I have related to you had happened within a quarter of an hour. Oh, heaven! it seemed longer than all the preceding years of my life.
Having resolved upon a line of conduct, I pursued it with the sang-froid and accuracy of one of the superior scoundrels delineated by Du Boisgobey. The door of the flat was locked. If the servants, hardly due yet, returned unexpectedly, I would send them off to Victoria Station on some imaginary errand of their mistress’s.
I knelt beside my poor wife’s body once more, and with great difficulty took off her costume and loosely fastened on the maid’s garments.