CHAPTER XXX.
IN DEFENSE OF CRIME.
“He will never forget her,” said Lady Hermione, slowly, as the door closed after the unhappy man. “Oh, Ronald, if there be such a thing as haunting, do you think she haunts him?”
But Sir Ronald was not so quick as usual with an answer to his wife’s question; he held little Clare in his arms so that the pallor of his face was hidden.
“I think,” he replied, slowly, “that the discovery has become a mania with him: he will know no rest nor peace until he has found out something that troubles him.”
“And do you think, really,” she continued, “that he will find any clue to it ever so small?”
“My darling, I cannot say. Do not talk of it, Hermione; my soul seems to shiver at the bare recollection of the horror of the time.”
“It was a cruel deed,” she said, thoughtfully, “a cruel, merciless deed. Clarice never hurt any one in her life. I cannot understand it. Do you know what I have often thought, Ronald?”
“No,” he said, reluctantly, as though unwilling to pursue the subject. “I do not.”
“My idea is, and always has been, that the crime was committed by some madman. I read something in the papers years ago about a strong and most violent lunatic, who had escaped from custody and could not be found. After that I remember reading of what seemed to me very purposeless crimes—a woman cruelly slaughtered, a boy slain without reason, an old man barbarously murdered for murder’s sake—and I could not help, in my own mind, wondering if the wretched lunatic had been guilty of all.”
“It may have been so,” replied Sir Ronald.
“I ought not to pursue the subject,” said his wife; “but, Ronald, there are times when it has a fascination for me. Why, my darling, does it hurt you so?”
He turned his face to her, haggard with the old lines of pain.
“I suffered so much, Hermione, when it happened that, rather than endure any more, I would die; I could not endure it.”
She bent over him and kissed him. “I wish,” she said, thoughtfully, “that we could persuade Kenelm to give up his mania. I cannot bear to think of his blighted life—so useless, so utterly without purpose. Suppose that, after the lapse of long years, he did succeed in bringing the criminal to light, what good would he do?”
“Secure justice,” he replied. “My belief is, Hermione, that if Kenelm Eyrle found the criminal to be his own mother he would not rest until he had brought her to the scaffold.”
“Oh, Ronald, that is a terrible thing to say; yet I believe it, love. As you say, with him the idea has long been a mania. On every other point, Kenelm Eyrle is a sane man, a loyal, honorable gentleman; on this subject he is mad, and I have always thought mischief would come of it.”
He would have changed the subject then, but it seemed to have a morbid fascination for him. Something had crept into the sunshine and stolen its beauty away; the sweetest fragrance had left the flowers, a sudden chill and blight had come over the lovely, glowing morning. It was with something like a shudder that Lady Hermione drew nearer to her husband and laid her beautiful head on his breast.
“Ronald,” she said, “I want to ask you something; do you believe that murder should be punished by death?”
“I do not know. Yes, I think I do. The Bible says so. A life for a life seems but just and fair.”
“Yet what good can it do?” she continued. “If anger, or madness, or vengeance leads one man to slay another, why hurry him from the world also? It seems to me two souls are imperiled then, instead of one; why not give him time to repent—a lifetime if need be, in which to repent and seek God’s pardon?”
“He might not repent,” said Sir Ronald; “there are some such cases; some crimes of which, instead of repenting, men simply grow proud. Do you think Charlotte Corday ever repented the murder of Marat? Tell me, do you think she did?”
Lady Hermione looked half puzzled for a few minutes.
“I can hardly tell; I should say she repented what she thought the need for killing him. Oh, Ronald, you are making me defend murder.”
“No, I am not; I simply say there are some murders of which I am sure men never repent. Therefore the life you give them would be mistaken clemency. If a life must be paid for a life, let the forfeit be laid down at once.”
She was looking at him with wondering eyes.
“Why, Ronald, how much you have thought of these things; you have studied them.”
“Yes,” he replied, quietly, “for many months after Clarice died I thought of nothing else. Men cannot judge as God can; we only see one-half, not always that, even that half not always clearly. Men know a crime has been committed; they do not know what has led up to it; the hidden motives, the great provocations, who knows anything of those save God himself?”
“But, Ronald,” she said, “surely you are defending crime! Darling, you are speaking without weighing your words. You do not believe that any amount of provocation can excuse murder?”
As she asked the question a dead silence fell on them. The whisper of the winds, the music of the birds, the ripple of the fountains, seemed to grow strangely hushed, as though every sweet impulse of nature waited to hear what he would say.
“You do not answer me,” she said, “yet, Ronald, my question is so plain. Do you think anything, any provocation, can excuse murder?”
Again the strange silence—in after years it returned to her—and she knew it had been more eloquent than any words.
“I cannot answer you,” he replied, after a time. “I have thought of it, but my mind has never been quite clear. Yes, I think some provocation, some treachery so great as to excuse murder.”
“Oh, Ronald, that is a dangerous doctrine.”
“Suppose,” he said, “I had lived in India at the time of the mutiny, and I had found some black fiend with his hand on your throat, or with my baby’s golden head just cloven in twain, I would have slain him with less remorse than I crush this leaf between my fingers.”
“But that,” she argued, “would be self-defence, not murder. Murder seems to me to be the cowardly death that creeps in silence, in treachery, and darkness—that sends the victim’s soul, with one horrible pang, straight into the presence of its Maker! Oh, Ronald, why are we speaking of such things? Poor Clarice! it seems to me I have never realized her terrible fate until now.”
Sir Ronald rose from his seat.
“Look how we have saddened the children, Hermione. Here is Harry, grave as a judge, and little Clare getting ready to cry. My darling, let the dead past be. Let us live in the sunny present.”
“It was Kenelm’s fault,” she said, half apologetically, “not mine. How strangely we have been talking! Every morning and night, when the little ones say their prayers, I shall make them add: ‘Please, God, teach those who suffer to forget.’”
“Papa,” cried a childish voice, “you said I should ride to-day.”
“So I did, Harry. Now, Hermione, come out on the lawn, and see your son take his first lesson in horsemanship.”
The bell was rung, a few words said to the servant, and then a beautiful little pony was led on to the lawn. The children clapped their hands in glee. Sir Ronald bent down and kissed his wife.
“My good angel,” he whispered, “my bright, winsome wife, I have saddened you with my queer ideas; forget everything except that you are the sunshine of my home. Come out, love, among the flowers and see the children at play.”
So she shook off, so far as she could, all memory of that conversation, and she stood in the sunshine on the emerald lawn, little Clare clinging to her dress, watching the princely boy taking his first lesson in riding and wondering to herself why it was God’s will she should be there, blessed and loving, while the murdered wife slept in her quiet grave. Then, with grave rebuke to herself, she raised her face to the smiling heavens, and remembered that He who reigned there knew best.