“At such times only a close observer can tell from his manner that everything is not right.

“Ralph, who always could manage him, prevented his taking anything to drink.  He depends upon Ralph, and it will be harder for me when he is not with us.  His attitude towards me is just about what it has always been.  I try to amuse him by reading the newspapers and with games; we have a chess-board.  At times he seems grateful, and then he will suddenly grow tired and hard to control.  Once or twice I have had to call in Dr. Magruder, who owns the hospital.

“It has been terribly hard for me to write all this, but I had to do it, in order that you might understand the situation completely.  Hugh dear, I simply can’t leave him.  This has been becoming clearer and clearer to me all these weeks, but it breaks my heart to have to write it.  I have struggled against it, I have lain awake nights trying to find justification for going to you, but it is stronger than I. I am afraid of it—­I suppose that’s the truth.  Even in those unforgettable days at the farm I was afraid of it, although I did not know what it was to be.  Call it what you like, say that I am weak.  I am willing to acknowledge that it is weakness.  I wish no credit for it, it gives me no glow, the thought of it makes my heart sick.  I’m not big enough I suppose that’s the real truth.  I once might have been; but I’m not now,—­the years of the life I chose have made a coward of me.  It’s not a question of morals or duty it’s simply that I can’t take the thing for which my soul craves.  It’s too late.  If I believed in prayer I’d pray that you might pity and forgive me.  I really can’t expect you to understand what I can’t myself explain.  Oh, I need pity—­and I pity you, my dear.  I can only hope that you will not suffer as I shall, that you will find relief away to work out your life.  But I will not change my decision, I cannot change it.  Don’t come on, don’t attempt to see me now.  I can’t stand any more than I am standing, I should lose my mind.”

Here the letter was blotted, and some words scratched out.  I was unable to reconstruct them.

“Ralph and I,” she proceeded irrelevantly, “have got Ham to agree to go to Buzzard’s Bay, and we have taken a house near Wareham.  Write and tell me that you forgive and pity me.  I love you even more, if such a thing is possible, than I have ever loved you.  This is my only comfort and compensation, that I have had and have been able to feel such a love, and I know I shall always feel it.—­Nancy.”  The first effect of this letter was a paralyzing one.  I was unable to realize or believe the thing that had happened to me, and I sat stupidly holding the sheet in my hand until I heard voices along the path, and then I fled instinctively, like an animal, to hide my injury from any persons I might meet.  I wandered down the shore of the lake, striking at length into the woods, seeking some inviolable shelter; nor was I conscious of physical effort until I found