Trial--The Woman Grows Strong

Base necessity, but still, as I then fancied, a necessity not the
less. Ah I was I not a thing to be pitied? Was ever any case more
pitiable than mine? I ask not this question with any hope that
an answer may be found to justify my conduct. It is not the less
pitiable--nay, it is more--that no such answer can be found. My
folly is not the less a thing of pity, because it is also a thing
of scorn. That was the pity--and yet, I was most severely tried.
Deep were my sufferings! Strong was that demon within me--I care
not how engendered, whether by the fault and folly of others, or
by my own--still it was strong. If I was guilty--base, blind--was
I not also suffering? Never did I inflict on the bosom of Julia
Clifford, so deep a pang as I daily--nay, hourly, inflicted upon
my own. She was a victim, true--but was I less so! But she was
innocently a victim, therefore, less a sufferer, whatever her
sufferings, than me! Let none condemn or curse me, till they have
asked what curse I have already undergone. I live!--they will say.
Ah! me! They must ask what is the value of life, not to themselves,
but to a crushed, a blasted heart, like mine! But I hurry forward
with my pangs rather than my story.

Instantly, a barrier seemed to rise up between Julia Clifford ind
myself. She had her consciousness, evidently, no less than I. What
was THAT consciousness? Ah! could I have guessed THAT, there would
have been no barrier--all might have been peace again. But a destiny
was at work which forbade it all; and we strove ignorantly with
one another and against ourselves. There was a barrier between
us, which our mutual blindness of heart made daily thicker, and
higher, and less liable to overthrow. A coldness overspread my
manner. I made it a sort of shelter. The guise of indifference is
one of the most convenient for hiding other and darker feelings.
Already we ceased to ramble by river and through wood. Already the
pencil was discarded. We could no longer enjoy the things which
so lately made us happy, because we no longer entertained the same
confidence in one another. Without this confidence there is no
communion sweet. And all this had been the work of that letter. The
name of William Edgarton had done it all--his name and threatened
visit!