His vengeance, I assume, for what had happened to her as she kept his whereabouts secret.
I had trouble with “none did give up their share of the misery” but I figured it out. :)
The scene was handled with a victorian grace.

I was so wanting this to end like Kenny Roger’s ‘Coward of the County’, but not everything can have a happy ending. Great setup story.

This was very good. There was something very distinctive about the title which drew me in.
Stylistically, it was very different too. Not quite third person narrative, but more like third person, one person removed. Not so much telling a story, but telling the story of telling a story.

I’m not sure I’m explaining that well.

As ElshaHawk said above, some of the turns of phrase such as “none did give up their share of the misery” elevate it from a simple recounting of events. Really nicely done.