pretty young wife. And he had a son.

The new knowledge hurt, and Evelina had fancied that she could be hurt
no more, that she had reached the uttermost limits of pain. By a
singular irony, the last refuge was denied her at the very moment of
her greatest temptation to avail herself of it. Long hours of thought
led her invariably to the one possible conclusion--to avoid every one,
keep wholly to herself, and, by starvation, if need be, save enough of
her insignificant pittance to take her far away. And after
that--freedom.

Since the night of full realisation which had turned her brown hair to
a dull white she had thought of death in but one way--escape. Set free
from the insufferable bondage of earthly existence. Miss Evelina
dreamed of peace as a prisoner in a dungeon may dream of green fields.
To sleep and wake no more, never to feel again the cold hand upon her
heart that tore persistently at the inmost fibres of it, to forget----

Miss Evelina took the vial from her bag and uncorked it. The incense
of the poppies crept subtly through the room, mingling inextricably
with the mustiness and the dust. The grey cobwebs swayed at the
windows, sunset touching them to iridescence. Conscious that she was
the most desolate and lonely thing in all the desolate house, Miss
Evelina buried her face in her hands.

The poppies breathed from the vial. In her distorted fancy, she saw
vast plains of them, shimmering in the sun--scarlet like the lips of a
girl, pink as the flush of dawn upon the eastern sky, blood-red as the
passionate heart that never dreamed of betrayal.