Page:Adventures of Susan Hopley (Volume 1).pdf/230

Rh unhappy situation to which his folly and crime had reduced him. He was a man untried in affliction; for till that one fatal error had planted a thorn in his pillow, his days had passed in cheerful contentment and his nights in unbroken sleep. From that moment he had been restless, abstracted, and occasionally irritable; humours so unusual with him, that his wife had imagined him ill; he had denied it; but the moment was now come when concealment and denial could no longer availprobably the next postat all events a few hours must tell her all, and expose him to the vengeance of the law, and the scorn of mankind. It was true, there might be yet time to fly if he mounted one of the earliest coaches, he might possibly reach the coast, and be across the channel before pursuit could be commenced. But in the first place he had no money; in the second he felt remorse at the idea of taking care of himself and leaving his poor wife to bear the horror of the surprise, and the ignominy of the exposure aloneand thirdly, he hadn't energy for the enterprise. He was utterly cast down and depressedwhat would be the use of escaping? He could never be happy. Even if he could find the means of supporting life, it would not be worth