zon, and flooded the chamber where
they were.

After a silence, Charles Marston said, with some little
embarrassment--"It may be a strange confession to make, though, indeed,
hardly so to you--for you know but too well the gloomy reserve with which
my father has uniformly treated me--that the exact nature of Merton's
confession never reached my ears; and once or twice, when I approached
the subject, in conversation with you, it seemed to me that the subject
was one which, for some reason, it was painful to you to enter upon."

"And so it was, in truth, my young friend--so it was; for that confession
left behind it many fearful doubts, proving, indeed, nothing but the one
fact, that, morally, the wretched man was guilty of the murder."

Charles, urged by a feeling of the keenest interest, requested Dr.
Danvers to detail to him the particulars of the dying man's narration.

"Willingly," answered Dr. Danvers, with a look of gloom, and heaving a
profound sigh--"willingly, for you have now come to an age when you may
safely be entrusted with secrets affecting your own family, and which,
although, thank God, as I believe they in no respect involve the honor of
anyone of its members, yet might deeply involve its peace and its
security against the assaults of vague and horrible slander. Here, then,
is the narrative: Merton, when he was conscious of the approach of death,
qualified, by a circumstantial and detailed statement, the absolute
confession of guilt which he had at first sullenly made. In this he
declared that the guilt of design and intention only was his--that in
the act itself he had been anticipated. He stated, that from the moment
when Sir Wynston's servant had casually mentioned the circumstance of his
master's usually sleeping with his watch and pocketbook under his pillow,
the idea of robbing him had taken possession of his mind. With the idea
of robbing him (under the peculiar circumstances, his servant sleeping in
the apartment close by, and the slightest alarm being, in all
probability, sufficient to call him to the spot) the idea of anticipating
resistance by murder had associated itself. He had contended against
these haunting and growing solicitations of Satan, with an earnest agony.
He had intended to leave his place, and fly from the mysterious
temptation which he felt he wanted power to combat, but accident or fate
prevented him. In a state of ghastly excitement he had, on the memorable
night of Sir