f a man Michael Snowdon was then; no, you don't
know what I was then. You're not to think I ill-used her in the common
way; I never raised my hand, thank God! and I never spoke a word a man
should be ashamed of. But I was a hard, self-willed, stubborn fool How
she came to like me and to marry me, I don't know; we were so different
in every way. Well, it was partly my nature and partly what I'd gone
through; we hadn't been married more than a month or two when I began
to find fault with her, and from that day on she could never please me.
I earned five-and-twenty shillings a week, and I'd made up my mind that
we must save out of it. I wouldn't let _her_ work; no, what _she_ had
to do was to keep the home on as little as possible, and always have
everything clean and straight when I got back at night. But Jenny
hadn't the same ideas about things as I had. She couldn't pinch and
pare, and our plans of saving came to nothing. It grew worse as the
children were horn. The more need there was for carefulness, the more
heedless Jenny seemed to get. And it was my fault, mine from beginning
to end. Another man would have been gentle with her and showed her
kindly when she was wrong, and have been thankful for the love she gave
him, whatever her faults. That wasn't my way. I got angry, and made her
life a burden to her. I must have things done exactly as I wished; if
not, there was no end to my fault-finding. And yet, if you'll believe
it, I loved my wife as truly as man ever did. Jenny couldn't understand
that--and how should she? At last she began to deceive me in all sorts
of little things; she got into debt with shop-people, she showed me
false accounts, she pawned things without my knowing. Last of all, she
began to drink. Our fourth child was born just at that time; Jenny had
a bad illness, and I believe it set her mind wrong. I lost all control
of her, and she used to say if it wasn't for the children she'd go and
leave me. One morning we quarrelled very badly, and I did as I'd
threatened to--I walked about the streets all the night that followed,
never coming home. I went to work next day, but at dinner-time I got
frightened and ran home just to speak a word. Little Mike, the eldest,
was playing on the stairs, and he said his mother was asleep. I went
into the room, and saw Jenny lying on the bed dressed. There was
something queer in the way her arms were stretched out. When I got near
I saw she was dead. She'd taken poison.