He shook off the beginnings of doubt impatiently.  He retraced his grievances and dwelt on the glory of his revenge as he reached his secret place after the crime.  But the stain darkened in the heart of his mind; and before dawn crept through cracks in the roof above his lair, dissolution had begun.

Through the hours of that first day he lay there with his thoughts for company and a process, deepening, as dusk deepened, into remorse began to horrify him.  He fought with all his might against it.  He resented it with indignation.  His gorge rose against it; he would have strangled it, had it been a ponderable thing within his power to destroy; but as time passed he began to know it was stronger than he.  It gripped his spirit with unconquerable fingers and slowly stifled him.  Time crept on interminable.  When the second night came, he was faint and turned to his food.  He struggled with himself and opened a tin of salmon.  But he could not eat.  He believed that he would never eat again.  He slept for an hour, then woke from terrifying dreams.  His mind wandered and he longed to be gone and tear off his clothes and dip into the sea.

At dawn of the second day men were hunting the old stores, from its cellars to the attics below him.  He heard them speaking under his feet and listened to two men who cursed him.  They speculated whether he was too young to hang and hoped he might not be.  Yet he could take pride in their failure to find him.  There was, as he remembered, only one person in the world who knew of his eerie; but terror did not accompany this recollection.  His exultation at the defeat of the searchers soon vanished, and he found himself indifferent to the thought that Estelle might remember.

He knew that his plans could not be fulfilled now:  it was impossible for him to live a fortnight here.  And then he began stealthily, fearfully, to doubt of life itself.  It had changed in its aspect and invitation.  Its promises were dead.  It could hold nothing for him as he had been told by Levi Baggs.  The emotions now threatening his mind were such that he believed no length of days would ever dim them; from what he suffered now, it seemed that time’s self could promise no escape.  Life would be hell and not worth living.  At this point in his struggles his mind failed him and became disordered.  It worked fitfully, and its processes were broken with blanks and breaks.  Chaos marked his mental steps from this point; his feet were caught and he fell down and down, yet tried hard for a while to stay his fall.  His consciousness began to decide, while his natural instincts struggled against the decision.  Not one, but rival spirits tore him.  Reason formed no part in the encounter; no arbiter arose between the conflicting forces, between a gathering will to die and escape further torment, and the brute will to live, that must belong to every young creature, happy or wretched.

The trial was long drawn out; but it had ended some hours before Estelle stood beside him.