now, but she and Mary were just
inseparable. I can see now how she was plotting and scheming and
poisoning my wife's mind against me, but I was such a blind beetle that
I could not understand it at the time. Then I broke my blue ribbon and
began to drink again, but I think I should not have done it if Mary had
been the same as ever. She had some reason to be disgusted with me now,
and the gap between us began to be wider and wider. And then this Alec
Fairbairn chipped in, and things became a thousand times blacker.

"'It was to see Sarah that he came to my house first, but soon it was
to see us, for he was a man with winning ways, and he made friends
wherever he went. He was a dashing, swaggering chap, smart and curled,
who had seen half the world and could talk of what he had seen. He was
good company, I won't deny it, and he had wonderful polite ways with
him for a sailor man, so that I think there must have been a time when
he knew more of the poop than the forecastle. For a month he was in
and out of my house, and never once did it cross my mind that harm
might come of his soft, tricky ways. And then at last something made
me suspect, and from that day my peace was gone forever.

"'It was only a little thing, too. I had come into the parlour
unexpected, and as I walked in at the door I saw a light of welcome on
my wife's face. But as she saw who it was it faded again, and she
turned away with a look of disappointment. That was enough for me.
There was no one but Alec Fairbairn whose step she could have mistaken
for mine. If I could have seen him then I should have killed him, for
I have always been like a madman when my temper gets loose. Mary saw
the devil's light in my eyes, and she ran forward with her hands on my
sleeve. "Don't, Jim, don't!" says she. "Where's Sarah?" I asked. "In
the kitchen," says she. "Sarah," says I as I went in, "this man
Fairbairn is never to darken my door again." "Why not?" says she.
"Because I order it." "Oh!" says she, "if my friends are not good
enough for this house, then I am not good enough for it either." "You
can do what you like," says I, "but if Fairbairn shows his face here
again I'll send you one of his ears for a keepsake." She was
frightened by my face, I think, for she never answered a word, and the
same evening she left my house.

"'Well, I don't know now whether it was pure devilry on the part of
this woman, or whether she thought that she could tur