Jack drew his hand over his chin and reflected silently.
“That’s odd,” he said, after a pause.
“Yet very comprehensible. I might almost
have thought of that before: might have arrived
at it on general principles. Psychologically
and physiologically it’s exactly what one would
have expected from the nature of memory. And
yet it never occurred to me. Set up the train
of thought in the order in which it originally presented
itself, and the links may readily restore themselves
in successive series. Try to trace it backward
in the inverse order, and the process is very much
more difficult and involved.—Well, we’ll
try things just so with you, Una. We’ll
begin by reconstructing your first life as far as we
can from the very outset, with the aid of these stray
hints of yours; and then we’ll see whether we
can get you to remember all your past up to the day
of the accident more easily.”
I gazed up at him with gratitude.
“Oh, Jack,” I said, trembling, “in
spite of this shock, I believe I can do it now.
I believe I can remember. The scales are falling
from my eyes. I’m becoming myself again.
What you’ve said and what you’ve shown
me seems to have broken down a veil. I feel as
if I could reconstruct all now, when once the key’s
suggested to me.”
He smiled at me encouragingly. Oh, how could
I ever have doubted him?
“That’s right, darling,” he answered.
“I should have expected as much, indeed.
For now for the very first time since the accident
you’ve got really at the other side of the great
blank in your memory.”
I felt so happy, though I knew I was a murderess.
I didn’t mind now whether I was hanged or not.
To love Jack and be loved by him was quite enough
for me. When he called me “darling,”
I was in the seventh heavens. It sounded so familiar.
I knew he must have called me so, often and often
before, in the dim dead past that was just beginning
to recur to me.
THE STRANGER FROM THE SEA
I held his hand tight. It was so pleasant to
know I could love him now with a clear conscience,
even if I had to give myself up to the police to-morrow.
And indeed, being a woman, I didn’t really much
care whether they took me or not, if only I could love
Jack, and know Jack loved me.
“You must tell me everything—this
minute—Jack,” I said, clinging to
him like a child. “I can’t bear this
suspense. Begin telling me at once. You’ll
do me more harm than good if you keep me waiting any
longer.”
Jack took instinctively a medical view of the situation.
“So I think, my child,” he said, looking
lovingly at me. “Your nerves are on the
rack, and will be the better for unstringing.
Oh, Una, it’s such a comfort that you know at
last who I am! It’s such a comfort that
I’m able to talk to you to-day just as we two
used to talk four years ago in Devonshire!”
