Frenzy it was! and it led me to the performance of those things
of which I shame to speak. But the truth, and its honest utterance
now, must be one of those forms of atonement with which I may
hope, perhaps vainly, to lessen, in the sight of Heaven, some of
my human offences. I had scarcely reached the water-side before
a new impulse drove me back. You will scarcely believe me when I
tell you that I descended to the base character of the spy upon my
household. The blush is red on my cheek while I record the shameful
error. I entered the garden, stole like a felon to the lattice of
the apartment in which my wife sat with her guest, and looked in
with a greedy fear, upon the features of the two!
What were my own features then? What the expression of my eyes?
It was well that I could not see them; I felt that they must be
frightful. But what did I expect to see in this espionage? As I
live, honestly now, and with what degree of honesty I then possessed,
I may truly declare that when I THOUGHT upon the subject at all,
I had no more suspicion that my wife would be guilty of any gross
crime, than I had of the guilt of the Deity himself. Far from it.
Such a fancy never troubled me. But, what was it to me, loving as
I did, exclusive, and selfish, and exacting as I was--what was it
to me if, forbearing all crime of conduct, she yet regarded another
with eyes of idolatry--if her mind was yielded up to him in deference
and regard; and thoughts, disparaging to me, filled her brain with
his superior worth, manners, merits? He had tastes, perhaps talents,
which I had not. In the forum, in all the more energetic, more
imposing performances of life, William Edgerton, I knew, could
take no rank in competition with myself. But I was no ladies' man.
I had no arts of society. My manners were even rude. My address
was direct almost to bluntncss. I had no discriminating graces,
and could make no sacrifice, in that school of polish, where the
delicacy is too apt to become false, and the performances trifling.
It is idle to dwell on this; still more idle to speculate upon
probable causes. It may be that there are persons in the world of
both sexes, and governed by like influences, who have been guilty
of like follies; to them my revelations may be of service. My
discoveries, if I have made any, were quite too late to be of much
help to me.
To resume, I prowled like a guilty phantom around my own habitation. I
scanned closely, with the keenest eyes of jealousy, every feature,
every movement of the two within. In the eyes of Edgerton,
I beheld--I did not deceive myself in this--I beheld the speaking
soul, devoted, rapt, full of love for the object of his survey.
That he loved her was to me sufficiently clear. His words were few,
faintly spoken, timid. His eyes did not encounter hers; but when
hers were averted, they riveted their fixed glances upon her face
with the adherence of the yearning steel for the magnet! Bitterly
did I gnash my teeth--bitterly did my spirit rise in rebellion, as
I noted these characteristics. But, vainly, with all my perversity
of feeling and judgment, did I examine the air, the look, the
action, the expression, the tones, the words of my wife, to make a
like discovery. All was passionless, all seeming pure, in her whole
conduct. She was gentle in her manner, kind in her words, considerate
in her attentions; but so entirely at ease, so evidently unconscious,
as well of improper thoughts in herself as of an improper tendency
in him, that, though still resolute to be wilful and unhappy, I
yet could see nothing of which I could reasonably complain. Nay,
I fancied that there was a touch of listlessness, amounting to
indifference, in her air, as if she really wished him to be gone;
and, for a moment, my heart beat with a returning flood of tenderness,
that almost prompted me to rush suddenly into the apartment and
clasp her to my arms.