Alone with the dying Teresa. “Take comfort,” said the good chaplain, regarding her with tenderness and compassion. “Ease your breast by a full confession, and then, if your repentance is sincere, doubt not Heaven's goodness and mercy. Our blessed Saviour will not desert you.”
On this, Teresa knelt down before him, and, though he strove to raise her, she would not quit the humble posture.
“Prepare yourself for a dreadful relation, reverend sir,” she said, clasping her hands. “I had the best and kindest of husbands, who studied my every wish, and strove in every way to make me happy. I persuaded him I was happy; but I deceived him. The yoke I had put on was unsupportable.
“An evil spirit seemed to have taken possession of my breast. I strove to dismiss the wicked thoughts that assailed me; but they came back again and again, and with greater force than before.
“I had not a fault to find with my husband—he was kindness itself. Yet I sought to get rid of him by poison. It was long before I could make up my mind to the dreadful act; but I was ever brooding upon it.
“At last I obtained the poison, minute doses of which would kill without exciting suspicion. But not till my husband was attacked by some slight illness did I administer the first dose.
“He grew worse. But it seemed only a natural increase of the malady, and the symptoms excited no suspicion whatever in his medical attendant, the progress of the poison being so slow and insidious. Moreover, I was constantly with my victim, and acted as his nurse.”
The good chaplain covered his face with his hands, and a short pause ensued, which was broken by Teresa.
“And now comes the astounding part of my narration,” she said. “I can scarcely credit my own hardness of heart. As I saw this kind and excellent man, who loved me so dearly, gradually wasting away—literally dying by inches—I felt no compunction—none! I counted the days he could live.”
Here there was another pause, and the guilty woman had to summon up resolution before she could proceed.