after giving me my composing draught. My courage
failed me at the sight of you. I thought to myself, 'If he look at me
kindly, I will confess what I have done, and let him save my life.' You
never looked at me at all. You only looked at the medicine. I let you go
without saying a word.

"Half-past five.

"I begin to feel the first effects of the poison. The nurse is asleep
at the foot of my bed. I won't call for assistance; I won't wake her. I
will die.

"Half-past nine.

"The agony was beyond my endurance--I awoke the nurse. I have seen the
doctor.

"Nobody suspects anything. Strange to say, the pain has left me; I have
evidently taken too little of the poison. I must open the bottle which
contains the larger quantity. Fortunately, you are not near me--my
resolution to die, or, rather, my loathing of life, remains as bitterly
unaltered as ever. To make sure of my courage, I have forbidden the
nurse to send for you. She has just gone downstairs by my orders. I am
free to get the poison out of my dressing-case.

"Ten minutes to ten.

"I had just time to hide the bottle (after the nurse had left me) when
you came into my room.

"I had another moment of weakness when I saw you. I determined to give
myself a last chance of life. That is to say, I determined to offer you
a last opportunity of treating me kindly. I asked you to get me a cup of
tea. If, in paying me this little attention, you only encouraged me by
one fond word or one fond look, I resolved not to take the second dose
of poison.

"You obeyed my wishes, but you were not kind. You gave me my tea,
Eustace, as if you were giving a drink to your dog. And then you
wondered in a languid way (thinking, I suppose, of Mrs. Beauly all the
time), at my dropping the cup in handing it back to you. I really could
not help it; my hand _would_ tremble. In my place, your hand might have
trembled too--with the arsenic under the bedclothes. You politely hoped,
before you went away? that the tea would do me good--and, oh God, you
could not even look at me when you said that! You looked at the broken
bits of the tea-cup.

"The instant you were out of the room I took the poison--a double dose
this time.

"I have a little request to make here, while I think of it.

"After removing the label from the bottle, and putting it back, clean,
in my dressing-case, it struck me that I had failed to take the same
precaution (in the early morning) with the empty paper-packet, bea