As he stood and stared, his mind began to change:
perhaps, after all, what he saw, might be! The whole thing it had
displaced must then be a fancy--a creation of the dreaming brain!
God in heaven! if it could but be proven that he had never done it!
All the other wicked things he was--or supposed himself guilty
of--some of them so heavy that it had never seemed of the smallest
use to repent of them--all the rest might be forgiven him!--But what
difference would that make to the fact that he had done them? He
could never take his place as a gentleman where all was known! They
made such a fuss about a sin or two, that a man went and did worse
out of pure despair!
But if he had never murdered anybody! In that case he could almost
consent there should be a God! he could almost even thank him!--For
what! That he was not to be damned for the thing he had not done--a
thing he had had the misfortune to dream he had done--God never
interfering to protect him from the horrible fancy? What was the
good of a God that would not do that much for you--that left his
creatures to make fools of themselves, and only laughed at
them!--Bah! There was life in the old dog yet! If only he knew the
thing for a fancy!
The music ceased, and the silence was a shock to him. Again he began
to stare about him. He looked up. Before him in the air hovered the
pale face of the girl he had--or had not murdered! It was one of his
visions--but not therefore more unreal than any other appearance:
she came from the world of his imagination--so real to him that in
expectant moods it was the world into which he was to step the
moment he left the body.
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