The Regatta Mystery and Other Stories

But there was no bullet with my name on it. One nearly got me below the right ear and one was deflected by a cigarette case in my pocket, but I

came through unscathed. Charles Crawley was

killed in action at the beginning of 1918.

Somehow--that made a difference. I came home in the autumn of 1918 just before the Armis-tice and I went straight to Sylvia and told her that I loved her. I hadn't much hope that she'd care for me straight away, and you could have knocked me down with a feather when she asked me why I hadn't told her sooner. I stammered out some-thing about Crawley and she said, "But why did you think I broke it off with him?" And then she told me that she'd fallen in love with me just as I'd done with her--from the very first minute.

I said I thought she'd broken off her engage-ment because of the story I told her and she laughed scornfully and said that if you loved a man you wouldn't be as cowardly as that, and we went over that old vision of mine again and agreed that it was queer, but nothing more.

Well, there's nothing much to tell for some time

IN A GLASS DARKLY 187

after that. Sylvia and I were married and we were happy. But I realized, as soon as she was really mine, that I wasn't cut out for the best kind of husband. I loved Sylvia devotedly, but I was jeal-ous, absurdly jealous of anyone she so much as smiled at. It amused her at first. I think she even rather liked it. It proved, at least, how devoted I

was.

As for me, I realized quite fully and unmistak-ably that I was not only making a fool of myself, but that I was endangering all the peace and hap-piness of our life together. I knew, I say, but I couldn't change. Every time Sylvia got a letter she didn't show to me I wondered who it was from. If she laughed and talked with any man, I found my-self getting sulky and watchful.

At first, as I say, Sylvia laughed at me. She thought it a huge joke. Then she didn't think the

joke so funny. Finally she didn't think it a joke at

all-

And slowly, she began to draw away from me. Not in any physical sense, but she withdrew her secret mind from me. I no longer knew what her thoughts were. She was kind--but sadly, as though from a long distance.

Little by little I realized that she no longer loved me. Her love had died and it was I who had killed it ....

The next step was inevitable. I found myself waiting for it--dreading it ....

Then Derek Wainwright came into our lives. He had everything that I hadn't. He had brains and a witty tongue. He was good-looking, too, and--I'm forced to admit it--a thoroughly good chap. As soon as I saw him I said to myself, "This is just

188 Agatha Christie

the man for Sylvia .... " She fought against it. I know she struggled...

but I gave her no help. I couldn't. I was en trenched in my gloomy, sullen reserve. I was suf fering like hell--and I couldn't stretch out a finger

to save myself. I didn't help her. I made things

worse. I let loose at her one day--a string of sav age, unwarranted abuse. I was nearly mad with

jealousy and misery. The things I said were cruel

and untrue and I knew while I was saying them

how cruel and how untrue they were. And yet I

took a savage pleasure in saying them ....

I remember how Sylvia flushed and shrank ....

I drove her to the edge of endurance.

I remember she said, "This can't go on " When

I came home that night the house was empty--empty.

There was a note--quite in the traditional fashion. In it she said that she was leaving me--for good. She was going down to Badgeworthy for a day or two. After that she was going to the one person who loved her and needed her. I was to take tha as final. I suppose that up to then I hadn't really believed my own suspicions. This confirmation in black and white of my worst fears sent me raving mad. I went down to Badgeworthy after her as fast as the car would take me. She had just changed her frock for dinner, I remember, when I burst into the room. I can see her face--startled--beautiful--afraid. I said, "No one but me shall ever have you. No one." And I caught her throat in my hands and gripped it and bent her backwards. IN A GLASS DARKLY

189

And stddenly I saw our reflection in the mirror. Sylvia choking amd myself strangling her, and the scar on rny cheek: where the bullet grazed it under the right ear.

No--I didn't kill her. That sudden revelation paralyzed me and I loosened my grasp and let her slip onto the floo ....

And then I broke down--and she comforted me .... Yes, she comforted me.

I told her everything and she told me that by the phrase "the one person who loved and needed her" she had meant her brother Alan .... We saw into eacla other's hearts that night, and I don't think, from that moment, that we ever drifted away from each other again ....

It's a sobering thought to go through life with --that, but for the grace of God and a mirror, one might be a murderer ....

One thing did die that night--the devil of jeal-ousy that had possessed me s°long ....