ast moment, however, doubts worried him about thus cutting
himself off from his past so utterly, and adopting another personality.
Some deep-lying repugnance stirred him against the double process. Would
it not be better to live under his own name in remote countries, and
thus be ready, if fate allowed, to return home at the proper time?
Perhaps. In that case he must be prepared for her pursuit, her letters,
her chicanery, which he could not bear. Her safety and his own, if the
stain of blood was to be kept off the name of Endicott, demanded the
absolute cessation of all relationship between them. Yet that did not
contain the whole reason. Lurking somewhere in those dark depths of the
soul, where the lead never penetrates, he found the thought of
vengeance. After all he did wish to punish her and to see her
punishment. He had thought to leave all to the gods, but feared the gods
would not do all their duty. If they needed spurring, he would be near
to provide new whips and fresher scorpions. He shook off hesitation when
the last day of his old life came, and made his farewells with decision.
A letter to his aunt and to his friend, bidding each find no wonder and
no worry about him in the events of the next month, and lose no time in
searching for him; a quiet talk with old Martha on her little verandah;
a visit to the pool on a soft August night; and an evening spent alone
in his father's house; these were his leave-takings.

They would never find a place in his life again, and he would never dare
to return to them; since the return of the criminal over the path by
which he escaped into secrecy gave him into the hands of his pursuers.
The old house had become the property of strangers. The offset to this
grief was the fact that Sonia would never dishonor it again with her
presence. Just now dabbling in her sins down by the summer sea, she was
probably reading the letter which he had sent her about business in
Wisconsin. Later a second letter would bear her the sentence of a living
death. The upright judge had made her the executioner. What a long
tragedy that would be! He thought of it as he wandered about the lovely
rooms of his old home; what long days of doubt before certainty would
come; what horror when bit by bit the scheme of his vengeance unfolded:
what vain, bitter, furious struggling to find and devour him; and then
the miserable ending when time had proved his disappearance absolute and
perfect!

At midnight