The Master of Man: The Story of a Sin

by Sir Hall Caine

Crushed and ashamed he would creep up to bed through the silent house, and thinking of the girl whose dark eyes had intoxicated him in the glen (the girl he had afterwards held in his arms) he would say,

"Is it possible that I can stand by and see her given over to the hangman?"

That terrified him. In the darkness he pictured to himself the scene of Bessie's death and burial, and thought of his after-life as a Judge, when he would have to go to Court to try other such cases—and Bessie lying out there in the prison-yard.

After Ballamoar, with its pastoral tranquillity, the twittering of birds and the sleepy singing of the streams, Fort Anne was sometimes a tempestuous place, with the wash of the waves in the harbour, the monotonous moan of the sea outside and the melancholy wail of the gulls. He thought he heard Bessie's cry in the voice of the sea—her piercing cry when she was being carried out of Court after he had sentenced her.

One night he thought Bessie was dead. He was dead too. They were standing side by side in an awful tribunal and she was accusing him before God.

"He let me die! He killed me! He is my assassin!"

The sound of his own voice awakened him. A dream! It was the grey of dawn; a storm had risen in the night; the white sea was rolling over the breakwater and the sea-fowl were screaming through the mist and roar.

No, by God! If it was a question of Bessie witnessing against him in this world or in the next, he had no longer any doubt which it should be. No more temptations! No more hypocrisy and self-doubt! No more wandering about like a lost soul!

He would go up to the Governor. He would call upon him to withdraw his objection to the Jury's recommendation. And if he refused .... he should see what he should see.

At eight o'clock in the morning he was walking down the quay in the calm sunshine, looking at the activities of the harbour, and nodding cheerfully to the fishermen as he passed. He was on his way to Government House, and his conscience, with which he had wrestled so long, was triumphant and erect.