If her own mother and
cousin could believe that she was ready to throw herself away for
the sake of such a wretch, what must the people of the hotel think?
What kind of a story would go abroad among her acquaintances in
the city? She fairly cringed and writhed at the thought of it all.
It seemed to the tortured and morbidly excited girl that there was
but one way out of her troubles, and dark and dreadful as was that
path, she thought it could lead to nothing so painful as that from
which she would escape.
But after all, her chief incentive to the fatal act was the hope
of securing Van Berg's respect, and of implanting herself in his
heart as an undying memory, even though a sad and terrible one.
With her ideas of the fitness of things this would be a strong
temptation at best; but the present conditions of her life, as we
have seen, so far from restraining, added greatly to the temptation.
And, as has been said, while the act seemed a stern and dreadful
alternative to worse evils, it was not revolting to her. She had
seen so many of her favorite heroines in fiction and actresses on
the stage "shuffle off the mortal coil" with the most appropriate
expressions and in the most becoming toilets and attitudes, that
her perverted and melodramatic taste led her to believe that Van
Berg would regard her crime as a sublime vindication of her honor.
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