me what may, I will have your life. I have come
to the end of what a man can endure."

"Accounts are not quite settled between us," said she, with a passion
that equalled my own. "I can love, and I can hate. You had your
choice. You chose to spurn the first; now you must test the other. It
will take a little more to break your spirit, I see, but broken it
shall be. Miss Marden comes back to-morrow, as I understand."

"What has that to do with you?" I cried. "It is a pollution that you
should dare even to think of her. If I thought that you would harm
her----"

She was frightened, I could see, though she tried to brazen it out.
She read the black thought in my mind, and cowered away from me.

"She is fortunate in having such a champion," said she. "He actually
dares to threaten a lonely woman. I must really congratulate Miss
Marden upon her protector."

The words were bitter, but the voice and manner were more acid still.

"There is no use talking," said I. "I only came here to tell you,--and
to tell you most solemnly,--that your next outrage upon me will be your
last." With that, as I heard Wilson's step upon the stair, I walked
from the room. Ay, she may look venomous and deadly, but, for all
that, she is beginning to see now that she has as much to fear from me
as I can have from her. Murder! It has an ugly sound. But you don't
talk of murdering a snake or of murdering a tiger. Let her have a care
now.

May 5. I met Agatha and her mother at the station at eleven o'clock.
She is looking so bright, so happy, so beautiful. And she was so
overjoyed to see me. What have I done to deserve such love? I went
back home with them, and we lunched together. All the troubles seem in
a moment to have been shredded back from my life. She tells me that I
am looking pale and worried and ill. The dear child puts it down to my
loneliness and the perfunctory attentions of a housekeeper. I pray
that she may never know the truth! May the shadow, if shadow there
must be, lie ever black across my life and leave hers in the sunshine.
I have just come back from them, feeling a new man. With her by my
side I think that I could show a bold face to any thing which life
might send.

5 P. M. Now, let me try to be accurate. Let me try to say exactly how
it occurred. It is fresh in my mind, and I can set it down correctly,
though it is not likely that the time will ever come when I shall
forget the doings of to