“Of all the follies that a man can commit, the greatest is acting on impulse. I acted on impulse when I married the unfortunate creature who is now my wife.
“Helena was then lost to me, as I too hastily supposed. She had married the man to whom she rashly engaged herself before she met with me. He was younger than I, and, to all appearance, heartier and stronger than I. So far as I could see, my fate was sealed for life. Helena had written her farewell letter, taking leave of me in this world for good. My prospects were closed; my hopes had ended. I had not an aspiration left; I had no necessity to stimulate me to take refuge in work. A chivalrous action, an exertion of noble self-denial, seemed to be all that was left to me, all that I was fit for.
“The circumstances of the moment adapted themselves, with a fatal facility, to this idea. The ill-fated woman who had become attached to me (Heaven knows—without so much as the shadow of encouragement on my part!) had, just at that time, rashly placed her reputation at the mercy of the world. It rested with me to silence the scandalous tongues that reviled her. With Helena lost to me, happiness was not to be expected. All women were equally indifferent to me. A generous action would be the salvation of this woman. Why not perform it? I married her on that impulse—married her just as I might have jumped into the water and saved her if she had been drowning; just as I might have knocked a man down if I had seen him ill-treating her in the street!
“And now the woman for whom I have made this sacrifice stands between me and my Helena—my Helena, free to pour out all the treasures of her love on the man who adores the earth that she touches with her foot!
“Fool! madman! Why don’t I dash out my brains against the wall that I see opposite to me while I write these lines?
“My gun is there in the corner. I have only to tie a string to the trigger and to put the muzzle to my mouth—No! My mother is alive; my mother’s love is sacred. I have no right to take the life which she gave me. I must suffer and submit. Oh, Helena! Helena!”
The third extract—one among many similar passages—had been written about two months before the death of the prisoner’s wife.
“More reproaches addressed to me! There never was such a woman for complaining; she lives in a perfect atmosphere of ill-temper and discontent.
“My new offenses are two in number: I never ask her to play to me now; and when she puts on a new dress expressly to please me, I never notice it. Notice it! Good Heavens! The effort of my life is not to notice her in anything she does or says. How could I keep my temper, unless I kept as much as possible out of the way of private interviews with her? And I do keep my temper. I am never hard on her; I never use harsh language to her. She has a double claim on my forbearance—-she is a woman, and the law has made her my wife. I remember this; but I am human. The less I see of her—except when visitors are present—the more certain I can feel of preserving my self-control.
“I wonder what it is that makes her so utterly distasteful to me? She is a plain woman; but I have seen uglier women than she whose caresses I could have endured without the sense of shrinking that comes over me when I am obliged to submit to her caresses. I keep the feeling hidden from her. She loves me, poor thing—and I pity her. I wish I could do more; I wish I could return in the smallest degree the feeling with which she regards me. But no—I can only pity her. If she would be content to live on friendly terms with me, and never to exact demonstrations of tenderness, we might get on pretty well. But she wants love. Unfortunate creature, she wants love!