hen he drew a new will, free from stain,
leaving all his property to his wife. He did not only that, but he
wrote her a letter--formal, of course--merely saying that he had found
his life a mistake; this he sealed, addressed, and placed in his
pocket.

Stockton--the false friend, the betrayer and destroyer--he should die,
he should die like a dog. But not with a stain on his name--that were
impossible, because it would reflect upon _her_.

Here was a new situation. The two men would be found dead, likely in
the same room--the friend and the husband. What would people think? A
duel? For what reason? Murder and suicide? Who had handled the weapon,
and for what possible cause? The road which suspicion would travel was
too short and wide. The fair name of the wife was to be guarded--that
had been decided upon, and now it was the first consideration.

There were other matters to be thought of. Suppose that Stockton had
been the husband and Randolph the friend. God! let us think. Have
brutes, frenzied with rage and jealousy, the power to hold nature's
mirror before the heart, to feel compassion, to exercise charity, to
weigh with a steady hand the weaknesses and frailties of their kind, to
feel humility, to bow the head before the inscrutable ways of nature?
Have they not? No? Well, then, have men? If they have not, they are no
better in that regard than brutes. Besides, would it punish Stockton to
kill him? There can be no punishment in death; it can be only in dying;
but even dying is not unpleasant, and death is the absence of
suffering. There was no way under heaven to give him adequate
punishment.

Nor was that all. _She_ loved him--that must be so. What would be the
benefit of removing him from her life? It would be merely revenge--revenge
upon both of them; and where lies the nobility of such revenge? If they
both should live, both go unexposed, they might be happy together.

After all, whom would that disturb, with whose pleasure interfere?
Surely no sound of their happiness could penetrate the grave; violence
would be done to none of nature's laws. Why should they not be happy?
If they could, why should they not? Was there any reason under the sun
that wisdom, charity, compassion, and a high manhood could give why
they should not be happy?

But suppose that she should suspect the cause of her husband's suicide;
this would likely poison her life, for the consciousness of guilt would
give substance to suspicion.