His eyes looked longingly at the poison. "It cures you when you are tired or troubled in your mind," he answered, repeating her own words. "I am but a little fellow—and I'm more easily tired sometimes than you would think."
She passed her handkerchief over her forehead. "The fire makes the room rather warm," she said.
Jack took no notice of the remark; he had not done yet with the confession of his little infirmities. He went on proving his claim to be favored with some of the wonderful remedy.
"And as for being troubled in my mind," he said, "you haven't a notion how bad I am sometimes. If I'm kept away from Mistress for a whole day—when I say or do something wrong, you know—I tell you this, I'm fit to hang myself! If you were to see me, I do think your heart would be touched; I do indeed!"
Instead of answering him, she rose abruptly, and hurried to the door.
"Surely there's somebody outside," she exclaimed—"somebody wanting to speak to me!"
"I don't hear it," said Jack; "and mine are the quickest ears in the house."
"Wait a minute, and let me see."
She opened the door: closed it again behind her; and hurried along the lonely corridor. Throwing up the window at the end, she put her head out into the keen wintry air, with a wild sense of relief. She was almost beside herself, without knowing why. Poor Jack's innocent attempts to persuade her to his destruction had, in their pitiable simplicity, laid a hold on that complex and terrible nature which shook it to its center. The woman stood face to face with her own contemplated crime, and trembled at the diabolical treachery of it. "What's the matter with me?" she wondered inwardly. "I feel as if I could destroy every poison in the chest with my own hands."
Slowly she returned along the corridor, to her room. The refreshing air had strung up her nerves again! she began to recover herself. The strengthened body reacted on the wavering mind. She smiled as she recalled her own weakness, looking at the bottle of poison which she had mechanically kept in her hand. "That feeble little creature might do some serious mischief, between this and the wedding-day," she thought; "and yet——and yet——"