"It is not the broken heart that kills, but broken pride." There is
the truth. She is in her grave, and I am going out into the dark.

He lay back exhausted for a moment, in desperate estate. The body was
fighting hard that the spirit might confess itself before the vital spark
died down for ever. Seizing a glass of cordial near, he drank of it.
The broken figure in its mortal defeat roused itself again, leaned over
the paper, and a shaking hand traced on the brief piteous record of a
life.

I climbed too fast. Things dazzled me. I thought too much of
myself--myself, myself was everything always; and myself has killed
me. In wanton haste I came to be admiral and sovereign duke, and it
has all come to nothing--nothing. I wronged you, I denied you,
there was the cause of all. There is no one to watch with me now to
the one moment of life that counts. In this hour the clock of time
fills all the space between earth and heaven. It will strike soon--
the awful clock. It will soon strike twelve: and then it will be
twelve of the clock for me always--always.

I know you never wanted revenge on me, Guida, but still you have it
here. My life is no more now than vraic upon a rock. I cling, I
cling, but that is all, and the waves break over me. I am no longer
an admiral, I am no more a duke--I am nothing. It is all done. Of
no account with men I am going to my judgment with God. But you
remain, and you are Princess Philip d'Avranche, and your son--your
son--will be Prince Guilbert d'Avranche. But I can leave him
naught, neither estates nor power. There is little honour in the
title now. So it may be you will not use it. But you will have a
new life: with my death happiness may begin again for you. That