“There’s no secrets. The letter’s like the man—cut and dried. Nobody else on God’s earth could have written it I should think. He feels that Medora made a mistake, but that it needn’t be fatal to all three of us; and that, as we all respect ourselves, and are responsible members of society, we can put the mistake right in a reasonable and dignified sort of way. Never a word of shame. He seems to think he’s only got to state the facts, as he sees them, for me to fall in with them. He says, of course, my first thought will be consideration for Medora, so that her sensitive and delicate nature may be spared as much as possible. He feels quite sure that he can leave the subject in my hands, and assures me that he will do everything possible to assist me. That’s the divorce of course. Medora wasn’t so nice in her letter. She ordered me to divorce her sharp. But even so, I’d sooner have her insults than his civility. Civility by God! From him. She’d worked herself up to a pitch of temper when she wrote that trash, and let out the poison he’s put into her mind. She’s a damned silly woman and that’s all there is to her; but faithless, worthless wretch that she is, I can forgive her easier than him. I don’t feel as if I wanted to shoot her, or cut her throat, or anything like that. My feeling to her is beyond my power to put into words at present, though no doubt it will clear itself. But I see him clear enough for a foul hypocrite—smug and sly and heartless. He’s played for his own hand for a year and slowly worked her up to the outrage she’s put on me. In fact I don’t see how I can very well help breaking his neck, when it comes to the point.” “It ain’t for me to stand up for him against you,” admitted Lydia. “All the same, my instinct tells me to pray you not to be rough, Ned. You’ve got right on your side, and it’s easier in some ways to suffer wrong than commit it.” “Depends what you call wrong,” he answered. “If Kellock thought it no wrong to kindiddle my wife away from me, why should I think it wrong to get back a bit of my own? Men have killed men for less than this, and a jury of husbands have said they wasn’t guilty. I may not be the sort to kill anybody; but I’ll let him that bleats such a lot about self-respect see I’ve got my self-respect as well as he has, and mean to act according. It’s all in the air—I don’t know what I shall do. I’ve got to make him eat his self-respect somehow and show him what he is; and that’s a long way different from what he thinks he is. I’ll make ’em look a pair of fools sooner or later—if no worse.” “So you will then; and take it in a high spirit and do nought to make yourself look a fool,” urged Lydia; but he declared that it was too late for that.