"I tried to pray, but could only groan. I took off my coat; but when I turned to hang it up, I saw my hat, hanging where you had placed it. I slipped on my coat again. I could not stay in this fragrance of violets, and in the desperate sense of loneliness they caused.

"I mounted to the hurricane deck, and paced up and down, up and down. For one wild moment I thought I would go off, when the pilot left; hurry back to you, confess all, and throw myself on your mercy—my wife, my wife!

"Then I knew I could never be such a hound as to do that. You had chosen me, because you trusted me. You had wedded me, on the distinct understanding that it was to mean nothing of what marriage usually means. I had agreed to this; therefore you were the one woman on the face of God's earth, whom I was bound in honour not to seek to win.

"Yet, I wanted you, my wife; and the hunger of that need was such fierce agony.

"I went to the side of the ship. Beating my clenched fists on the woodwork, seemed to help a little. Then—I looked over.

"We were surging along through the darkness. I could see the white foam on the waves, far down below.

"Then—Diana, dare I tell you all?—then the black waters tempted me. I was alone up there. It would mean only one headlong plunge—then silence and oblivion. God forgive me, that in the agony of that moment of Time, I forgot Eternity.

"But, lifting my eyes, I looked away from those black waters to where—clear on the horizon—shone a star.

"Somehow that star brought you nearer. It was a thing you might be seeing also, on this, our wedding-night. I stood very still and watched it, and it seemed to speak of hope. I prayed to be forgiven the sin of having harboured, even for a moment, that black, cowardly temptation.

"Then, all at once, I remembered something. May I tell you, my wife, my wife? It cannot harm you, after I am dead, that I should tell you. I remembered that you had laid your hand for one moment on the pillow in my bunk. At once, I seemed rich beyond compare. Your hand—your own dear hand!

"I ran down quickly, and in five minutes I was lying in the dark, the scent of violets all about me, and my head where your dear hand had rested. And then—God gave me sleep.

"My wife, I have often had hard times since then; but never so bad as that first night. And, though I have longed for you always, I would not have had less suffering; because, to have suffered less would have been to have loved you less; and to have loved you less would have been unworthy of you, Diana;—of you and of myself.

*