FullReads

“I think he had been dogging me; but I hadn’t chosen to let him get up to me till now. We were quite out of sight when he had reached the level bottom of the dip, where I had halted–quite out of sight, and quite alone. To do him justice, he came on steadily enough. His face was liker the sketch I had made of it, liker the face I had seen in my dream, than it had ever looked before. Evidently he had made up his mind…. At last, then!… Well, I had been waiting long!… He was close beside me.

“‘Ah! bon jour, cher Monsieur Steinmetz.‘

“‘So?’ he said, his little eyes contracting like a cobra’s. ‘Ah! Monsieur knows my name?’

“‘Among other things about you–yes.’

“‘So!’ The yellow face was turning grayer and harder every minute–liker and liker to my likeness of it. ‘And what other things? Has it never appeared to you that this you do, have been doing–this meddling, may be dangerous, hein?‘

“He had changed his tone, as he had changed the person in which he addressed me. Yes, he had certainly made up his mind. And his big right hand was hidden inside his waistcoat, so that I could not see the evil eye I knew was on his finger.

“‘Dangerous?’ he repeated slowly.

“‘Possibly.’

“‘Ay, surely; I shall crush you!’

“‘Try.’

“‘In good time; wait. You plot against me. Take care; I am strong; I warn you. There must be an end of this, you understand, or—-‘

“He nodded his big head significantly.

“‘You are right,’ I told him; ‘there must be an end. It is coming.’

“‘So?’

“‘Yes; I know you. You know me now.’

“‘I know you. What do you want?’

“‘To kill you.’

“‘So?’

“‘Yes; as you killed her.’

“‘As I killed her? That is it, then? You know that?’

“‘I know that.’

“‘Well, it is true. I killed her. Now you can guess what I am going to do to you–to you, curse you!–whom she loved.’

“The very face I had seen in my dream now, Bertie, the very face! There was something besides the evil eye that gleamed in his right hand when he drew it from his breast. Once more he spoke.

“‘Yes, I killed her. I meant worse for you. You escaped that; but you will not escape me now. Fool! were you mad to do this? Did not I hate you enough? And I would have let you be. Ah, die, then, if you will have it so!’

“His heavy right arm swung high as he spoke, and I saw the sharp steel gleam as it turned to fall. And I twisted from his grip, and caught the falling arm, and bent it till the dagger dropped to the ground. And then, for a fierce, desperate, devilish minute, I had him in my clutch, dragging him nearer the smooth, slippery edge. He was no match for me at this I knew, and he knew; but he held me with the hold of his despair, and I could not loose myself. Both of us together, he meant; but not I. Yet I only freed myself just as he rolled exhausted, but clutching at the tough, short bushes wildly, toward the brink, and partly over it…. Only the hold of his hands between him and his death. And I knelt above him, with the knife in my hand that was stained with her blood.

“The great yellow face, ashen now in its mortal agony, looked silently up at me–for three or four awful seconds; and then–then it disappeared.

“Bah!” Paul concluded, “that was the end of it.”