I began to see that I had acted throughout with the most abominable selfishness.  In his great love he had said little or nothing about himself.  But why had I not thought of him?  In the struggles of my religious conscience I had been thinking of myself alone, but Martin had been suffering too, and I had never once really thought of that?  What right had I to make him suffer?

After a while I began to prepare for bed, but it took me long to undress, for I stopped every moment to think.

I thought of the long years Martin had been waiting for me and while I was telling myself that he had kept pure for my sake, my heart was beating so fast that I could hardly bear the strain of it.

It cut me still deeper to think that even as there had been no other woman for him in the past so there would be no other in the future.  Never as long as he lived!  I was as sure of that as of the breath I breathed, and when I remembered what he had said about wearing the willow for me as if I were dead I was almost distracted.

His despairing words kept ringing mercilessly in my ears—­“It’s all as one now”; “How happy we might have been.”  I wanted to go to him and tell him that though I was sending him away still I loved him, and it was because I loved him that I was sending him away.

I had made one step towards the door before I remembered that it was too late to carry out my purpose.  The opportunity had passed.  Martin had gone to his room.  He might even be in bed by this time.

But there are spiritual influences which control our bodies independently of our will.  I put on my dressing-gown (being partly undressed) and went back to the boudoir.  I hardly knew what impulse impelled me to do so, and neither do I know why I went from the boudoir to the balcony unless it was in hope of the melancholy joy of standing once more where Martin and I had stood together a little while ago.

I was alone now.  The low thunder was still rolling along the cliffs, but I hardly heard it.  The white sheet lightning was still pulsing in the sky and rising, as it seemed, out of the sea, but I hardly saw it.

At one moment I caught a glimpse of a solitary fishing boat, under its brown lugger sails, heading towards Blackwater; at the next moment my eyes were dazzled as by a flashlight from some unseen battleship.

Leaning over the balcony and gazing into the intermittent darkness I pictured to myself the barren desolation of Martin’s life after he had left me.  Loving me so much he might fall into some excess, perhaps some vice, and if that happened what would be the measure of my responsibility?

Losing me he might lose his faith in God.  I had read of men becoming spiritual castaways after they had lost their anchorage in some great love, and I asked myself what should I do if Martin became an infidel.

And when I told myself that I could only save Martin’s soul by sacrificing my own I was overwhelmed by a love so great that I thought I could do even that.