“Why, Jack,” I cried clinging to him in
a perfect whirlwind of wonder, “one can hardly
believe it—that was only an hour ago!”
“That was only an hour ago,” Jack answered,
smiling. “But as for you, I suppose you’ve
lived half a lifetime again in it. And now you
know the whole secret of the Woodbury Mystery.
And you won’t want to give yourself up to the
police any longer.”
ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL
But why didn’t you explain it all to me at the
very first?” I exclaimed, all tremulous.
“When you met me at Quebec, I mean—why
didn’t you tell me then? Did you and Elsie
come there on purpose to meet me?”
“Yes, we came there to meet you,” Jack
answered. “But we were afraid to make ourselves
known to you all at once just at first, because, you
see, Una, I more than half suspected then, what I know
now to be the truth, that you were coming out to Canada
on purpose to hunt me up, not as your friend and future
husband, but in enmity and suspicion as your father’s
murderer. And in any case we were uncertain which
attitude you might adopt towards me. But I see
I must explain a little more even now. I haven’t
told you yet why I came at all to Canada.”
“Tell me now,” I answered. “I
must know everything to-day. I can never rest
now till I’ve heard the whole story.”
“Well,” Jack went on more calmly, “after
the first excitement wore off in the public mind,
there came after a bit a lull of languid interest;
the papers began to forget the supposed facts of the
murder, and to dwell far more upon your own new role
as a pyschological curiosity. They talked much
about your strange new life and its analogies elsewhere.
I was anxious to see you, of course, to satisfy myself
of your condition; but the doctors who had charge
of you refused to let you mix for a while with anyone
you had known in your First State; and I now think
wisely. It was best you should recover your general
health and faculties by slow degrees, without being
puzzled and distracted by constant upsetting recollections
and suggestions of your past history.
“But for me, of course, at the time, the separation
was terrible. Each morning, I read with feverish
interest the reports of your health, and longed, day
after day, to hear of some distinct improvement.
And yet at the same time, I was terrified at every
approach to complete convalescence: I feared that
if you got better at all, you might remember too quick,
and that then the sudden rush of recollection might
kill you or upset your reason. But by-and-by,
it became clear to me you could remember nothing of
the actual shot itself. And I saw plainly why.
It was the firing of the pistol that obliterated,
as it were, every trace of your past life in your
disorganised brain. And it obliterated itself
too. Your new life began just one moment later,
with the Picture of the dead man stretched before
you in his blood on the floor, and a figure in the
background disappearing through the window.”
