lost years of my life, they had not given Ruth back to me. My
evil deed had only made the evil more evil; had poisoned my own soul
with a poison more deadly. What right had I to visit vengeance upon my
brother's wrong-doing? Was I perfect? Had not hatred mastered my life
for years? Had I not allowed my lower nature to conquer my higher?
Yet I had dared to avenge my wrong. I had dared to take the work of
God into my own hands. "Vengeance is Mine, I will repay," said the
Lord.

Bitterly now did I feel the truth of this, for God was taking His
vengeance on me! I--I had broken His laws, I had yielded to the devil,
I had hurled the crown of my manhood from me.

And I still stood alone, with bare head and burning eyes, while in my
heart burned a scorching, tormenting, yet non-consuming fire.

Then a more terrible thought came. What I had done could never be
undone. Never! Age upon age might pass away, but that fact, ghastly
and black, would remain! It might be possible, I did not think He ever
would, but it might be possible that in the far-off future God would
forgive me. But then, even God could not undo the fact that I had
killed my brother.

But I had not intended to throw him over the cliff. His death was due
to an accident; I had not altogether yielded to the strivings of the
devil. True, true, and yet murder was in my heart, for did I not hate
him and had I not hated him for years.

"Whoso hateth his brother is a murderer." So said the disciple of the
Son of God, and I had hated him, and now neither God nor eternity could
undo what I had done.

I thought of my mother. Soon she would learn that Wilfred was dead,
and then her sky would be black, and it would be I, Roger, who had
blackened it. The deed which would bring her grey hair with sorrow to
the grave, had been done by me.

"Ah," I thought, "if I could only cease to be, cease to think," but
that, I knew, could never be. Had I hurled myself from that dizzy
height, so that my battered body might be beside my brother's, the
awful thing I had done would remain, and I should remain. I might kill
the body, but I could not kill the soul; and self-murder would make my
crime greater, not less.

Oh, how desolate the world was. The summer sky had no beauty; the
fields, which I could still dimly see, were shorn of every loveliness.

Then I looked seaward, and the only visible object was the ghastly rock
which was ever a nightmare to my soul.