that followed, in spite of the emotion which sometimes would grip me by the throat, I was conscious of the singular quality of her beauty, which caused it to increase as her agitation grew. Strangely out of keeping with the dreadful nature of some of the things she said was the air of innocence which accompanied them. She depicted herself as playing a leading part in a hideous tragedy, with the direct simplicity of a little child who confesses to faults of whose capital importance it has not the faintest notion.
"Did I kill him? Did I? Not then—no, not then. Then he came in, and it began all over again, right from the beginning; and—we quarrelled. We both said we would kill him, both of us; and he laughed. The more we said that we would kill him the more he laughed. And that—that made us worse. Then—then it came in. It! It!"
She shuddered. A look of abnormal terror came on her face. She covered her hands, uttering cries of panic fear.
"Don't! Don't! I won't! I won't! You mustn't make me, you mustn't! Don't let it come near me! Don't let it touch me! I can't bear to think of its touching me! Oh!"
With a gasp, uncovering her eyes, she stared, affrightedly, at something which she seemed to see in front of her.
