"Have I done this? Is that look of sorrow but the shadow of a charge which the recording angel is now writing down in the eternal book against me? Am I the murderer of this good old man? How he loved me! how kind, how generous, how delicate he was! And I--no, no! it must have been old age. Men of seventy do not sink down and perish in silence because they are not loved with the intensity given to youth. Oh, how I wish it were all over! While he lies in the house, so frozen and cold, I shall not draw a free breath. It seems to me as if he could rise up any moment out of that marble sleep with the power to search every thought that has been in my heart during the last year. His knowledge is perfect now; he reads my soul as I dare not read it myself. _Have_ I wished his death? Have I ever thought of what might happen after that? God forgive me, for I seem terrible to myself. "Death in the house; this great lonely dwelling, with all its luxurious appliances, is but a tomb. The air chills me; its solitude is terrible. Cora comes to me once in a while with her silky flatteries, and attempts to convince me that I have never been blamable as a wife. I know that she does not believe this, and almost hate her for thinking that her sophistry can reconcile me with myself. Yet what have I done? Amused myself--gathered crowds of admirers around me--neglected the only true love that ever lightened my life. Shall I ever be worshipped again as that old man worshipped me?... "They have carried him out from his home forever, and now the old house seems more vast and lonely than before. I still hear the tramping of his bearers' feet, and shudder as the pall seems to rustle and sweep by me. Ah! the first feelings of widowhood must be mournful indeed to a devoted wife; to me they are terrible. The very air seems to reproach me. I start at each sound as if it were a denunciation. The very air I breathe seems heavy with funereal shadows.... "The first great horror has left me, but a feeling of blank desolation still remains. I have not yet thought of the future, or asked myself what may be in store for the woman whom so many are loading with praises and commiseration which she knows in her heart are undeserved. "This morning I was aroused from the heavy apathy which has made my life a blank, by the arrival of my husband's solicitor. Mr. Dennison has left a will making me the inheritor of everything he had on earth. The lawyer told me this, and, for the first time since my widowhood, I felt the heart in my bosom stir like a living thing. Was I indeed so wealthy, and free, too! "I observed in a dreamy way that the lawyer looked anxious and oppressed, as if something yet remained to be told. "'Is this all,' I said; 'has he mentioned no other person in the will?'