I waited a minute, and then he went on.

 

“You understand, Sheppard, I’m telling you this in confidence. It’s to go no

further. I want your advice—I can’t carry the whole weight by myself. As I said

just now, I don’t know what to do.”

 

“Can you tell me the whole story?” I said. “I’m still in the dark. How did Mrs.

Ferrars come to make this confession to you?”

 

“It’s like this. Three months ago I asked Mrs. Ferrars to marry me.

 

She refused. I asked her again and she consented, but she refused to allow me to

make the engagement public until her year of mourning was up. Yesterday I called

upon her, pointed out that a year and three weeks had now elapsed since her

husband’s death, and that there could be no further objection to making the

engagement public property. I had noticed that she had been very strange in her

manner for some days.

 

Now, suddenly, without the least warning, she broke down completely.

 

She—she told me everything. Her hatred of her brute of a husband, her growing

love for me, and the—the dreadful means she had taken. Poison!

 

My God! It was murder in cold blood.”