o come.

He smiled now: it was like comfort in a dire hour of need; and when the
upbraidings of conscience would have made themselves heard, they were
crushed down and stifled; for Sir Murray Gernon had been keeping his
house swept and garnished for the reception of the wicked spirits, and
they had now fully seized upon the offered abode. He smiled, for he
thought that he now saw a way out of his difficulties, and that he had
but to design some means for removing his false wife from his path to
commence a new life.

How should it be? he thought. Should he contrive a boating party upon
the great lake? Boats had before now been upset, and their occupants
drowned. Such accidents were not at all uncommon. Or there might be
some terrible catastrophe with the spirited horses of the carriage; the
part of the Castle where her ladyship slept might catch fire at a time
when a hampered lock and fastened window precluded escape; or, better
still, there was poison!

The evil spirit must at that time have had full possession of the
citadel, for it was with a baleful glare in his eyes that Sir Murray
Gernon strode up and down his room, stepping softly, as if fearing to
interrupt the current of his thoughts--thoughts that, in his madness,
seemed to refresh the thirsty aridity of his soul. After all these
months of misery, had at last, then, come the solution of his
difficulty? and he laughed--and laughed savagely--as he sat down once
more to plan.

Mercy? What had he to do with mercy? What mercy had they had upon his
life? Had they not blighted it when he was a calm, trusting, loving
man, searing his spirit with something more burning and corroding than
the hottest iron--the sharpest acid? Let them seek for mercy elsewhere:
his duty was to dispense justice, and he would be just!

Who could gainsay it? Was it not written in the Book that the
punishment for the crime was death--that the sinners should be stoned
with stones until they died? Not that he would stone them: his should
be a quiet, insidious vengeance--one that the world should not suspect,
and he would plot it out in time.

But what if she were, after all, innocent?

He tore that thought from his heart, accusing himself of cowardice, and
of seeking a way out of what would be the path to a new life. No; there
was no innocence there. His would be a crusade against guilt; and he
vowed a fearful vow that he would carry out his vengeance to the end.

Should