I persevered in it like one. I yielded all opportunities for the meeting of the parties—all opportunities which, in yielding, did not expose me to the suspicion of having any sinister object. If, for example, I found, or could conjecture, that William Edgerton was likely to be at my house this or that evening, I studiously intimated, beforehand, some necessity for being myself absent. This carried me frequently from home—lone, wandering, vexing myself with the most hideous conjectures, the most self-torturing apprehensions. I sped away, obviously, into the city-to alleged meetings with friends or clients—or on some pretence or other which seemed ordinary and natural But my course was to return, and, under cover of night, to prowl, around my own premises, like some guilty ghost, doomed to haunt the scene of former happiness, in its wantonness rendered a scene of ever-during misery. Certainly, no guilty ghost ever suffered in his penal tortures a torture worse than mine at these humiliating moments. It was torture enough to me that I was sensible of all the unhappy meanness of my conduct. On this head, though I strove to excuse myself on the score of a supposed necessity, I could not deceive myself—not—not for the smallest moment.
Weeks passed in this manner—weeks to me of misery—of annoyance and secret suffering to my wife. In this time, my espionage resulted in nothing but what has been already shown—in what was already sufficiently obvious to me. William Edgerton continued his insane attentions: he sought my dwelling with studious perseverance—sought it particularly at those periods when he fancied I was absent—when he knew it—though such were not his exclusive periods of visitation. He came at times when I was at home. His passion for my wife was sufficiently evident to me, though her deportment was such as to persuade mo that she did not see it. All that I beheld of her conduct was irreproachable. There was a singular and sweet dignity in her air and manner, when they were together, that seemed one of the most insuperable barriers to any rash or presumptuous approach. While there was no constraint about her carriage, there was no familiarity—nothing to encourage or invite familiarity. While she answered freely, responding to all the needs of a suggested subject, she herself never seemed to broach one; and, after hours of nightly watch, which ran through a period of weeks, in which I strove at the shameful occupation of the espial, I was compelled to admit that all her part was as purely unexceptionable as the most jealous husband could have wished it.
But not so with the conduct of William Edgerton. His attentions were increasing. His passion was assuming some of the forms of that delirium to which, under encouragement, it is usually driven in the end. He now passionately watched my wife's countenance, and no longer averted his glance when it suddenly encountered hers. His eyes, naturally tender in expression, now assumed a look of irrepressible ardency, from which, I now fancied—pleased to fancy—that hers recoiled! He would linger long in silence, silently watching her, and seemingly unconscious, the while, equally of his scrutiny and his silence. At such times, I could perceive that Julia would turn aside, or her own eyes would be marked by an expression of the coldest vacancy, which, but for other circumstances, or in any other condition of my mind, would have seemed to me conclusive of her indignation or dislike. But, when such became my thought, it was soon expelled by some suggestion from the busy devil of my imagination:—
“They may well put on this appearance now; but are such their looks when they meet, sometimes for a whole morning, in the painting-room?” Even here, the fiend was silenced by a fact which was revealed to me in one of my nocturnal watches.
“Clifford not at home?” said Edgerton one evening as he entered, addressing my wife, and looking indifferently around the room. “I wished to tell him about some pictures which are to be seen at ——'s room—really a lovely Guido—an infant Savior—and something, said to be by Carlo Dolce, though I doubt. You must see them. Shall I call for you tomorrow morning?”
“I thank you, but have an engagement for the morning.”
“Well, the next day. They will remain but a few days longer in the city.”
“I am sorry, but I shall not be able to go even the next day, I am so busy.”
“Busy? ah! that reminds me to ask if you have given up the pencil altogether? Have you wholly abandoned the studio? I never see you now at work in the morning. I had no thought that you had so much of the fashionable taste for morning calls, shopping, and the like.”
“Nor have I,” was the quiet answer. “I seldom leave home in the morning.”