“But there can’t be any doubt. The whole thing hangs together. Colman was over head and ears in love with her before our marriage. He has been openly in love with her ever since. They have been associated in all her confounded schemes and philanthropies. He was always on her tongue and in her thoughts—always in the house when I wasn’t there. I remember he wanted to jump down my throat once because I suggested Irene had her faults like others. Look at those poems of his addressed to her. All the same story. This charge of murder is brought against him. His mouth is closed. For a time I didn’t believe the woman plea. However, we all agreed there was one. Who could it be? All of us floored. My wife half dead with anxiety—yet going through it day by day. We know what women can bear when it’s a question of concealment—a woman the other day was delivered of a child during a ball, and returned smiling to the ball-room—you saw the case. I don’t call Irene’s attitude any criterion of innocence. She keeps it up to the end. But when the rope is round his neck, her nerve gives way, and the whole thing comes out. Put upon oath, she gives it cut and dried—as cynically as you please—a woman all over. There’s no getting out of it. And I—I am the common mock of England.”
He spoke quietly, with an air of outraged dignity that won Harroway’s sympathy.
“It’s a miserable business altogether,” said the latter, biting the end of his quill-pen, as he sat in his leathern office-chair, pushed back slightly from the table.
“Then you agree with me that her explanation is preposterous?”
“The other thing bears the greater stamp of probability,” replied Harroway. And thus was Irene judged. Gerard felt relieved. Harroway’s opinion was of a certain value. It was sure to be the keynote of that of the Merriams’ social circle in which the old solicitor was an influential member, and Gerard was anxious to learn how society would take his divorce. For that purpose he had sought out Harroway in his office and plunged into the midst of things, with a frankness that was not altogether characteristic. He had gained his first point—a definite verdict against Irene. He himself believed her guilty. But a lurking, uncomfortable suspicion that proof of her innocence might not sing with his heart’s secret wishes made him distrustful of his own judgment. The contemplation of divorce was accompanied by sundry pricks of conscience. A vague fear assailed him that society might take Irene’s side. He sought the support of public opinion to bolster up a not too stout courage. He had a dim feeling that, in spite of his willingly jealous belief in her guilt, he was about to do Irene a great wrong by divorcing her.
“I am not a revengeful man, Harroway,” he said after a few moments’ silence. “I am only anxious to put an end to a tie the continuance of which would be a farce. It is not even as though I were putting her to public shame. She has done that herself already.”
“Then I would not be precipitate,” said Harroway. “You might feel disposed to forgive her. Such things have happened to men without loss of dignity.”
“I’m not going to forgive her. I don’t think she would desire it. The fact is our marriage has been a sham from the beginning. If I divorce her, she can marry Colman. I’m not likely—God forbid—to tie myself to a woman again. So it’s not for my sake. If I were seeking vengeance I should keep her legally tied. And I shan’t sue for damages.”
“The action would have to be undefended.”
“Precisely,” said Gerard, with a slight flush. Harroway rose and took two or three turns about the room, his hands behind his back.