ate--the gate in the meadow they call Pettit's Piece. I thought I would
shoot her. I went and fetched my gun and loaded it. I went out into
Pettit's Piece again. I was hard put to it to make up my mind. I thought
I would try my luck--I mean try whether to kill her or not---by throwing
up the Spud of the plow into the air. I said to myself, if it falls
flat, I'll spare her; if it falls point in the earth, I'll kill her. I
took a good swing with it, and shied it up. It fell point in the earth.
I went and shot her. It was a bad job, but I did it. I did it, as they
said I did it at the trial. I hope the Lord will have mercy on me. I
wish my mother to have my old clothes. I have no more to say."

In the happier days of her life, Magdalen would have passed over the
narrative of the execution, and the printed confession which accompanied
it unread; the subject would have failed to attract her. She read the
horrible story now--read it with an interest unintelligible to herself.
Her attention, which had wandered over higher and better things,
followed every sentence of the murderer's hideously direct confession
from beginning to end. If the man or the woman had been known to her,
if the place had been familiar to her memory, she could hardly have
followed the narrative more closely, or have felt a more distinct
impression of it left on her mind. She laid down the paper, wondering at
herself; she took it up once more, and tried to read some other portion
of the contents. The effort was useless; her attention wandered again.
She threw the paper away, and went out into the garden. The night
was dark; the stars were few and faint. She could just see the
gravel-walk--she could just pace backward and forward between the house
door and the gate.

The confession in the newspaper had taken a fearful hold on her mind. As
she paced the walk, the black night opened over the sea, and showed her
the murderer in the field hurling the Spud of the plow into the air. She
ran, shuddering, back to the house. The murderer followed her into the
parlor. She seized the candle and went up into her room. The vision of
her own distempered fancy followed her to the place where the laudanum
was hidden, and vanished there.

It was midnight, and there was no sign yet of the captain's return.

She took from the writing-case the long letter which she had written
to Norah, and slowly read it through. The letter quieted her. When she
reached the blank space le