"A life of which I am weary, weary! Have you ever loved, you man of ice? Have you ever been betrayed by the creature you adored?" I cried. "I would to God that you had killed me as I knelt beside her body in the park. I had then hardly realized her treachery!" I closed my eyes and shuddered, straining my muscles as though in a paroxysm of mental agony, the while.
"Hume!" said Sir Charles, "if you are not acting, you are desperate, and you have not lied to me. Take my advice and die while you are desperate! A pin prick and all will be over. I can promise you no pain."
The fact is I had acted far too well. It was necessary then to surpass my former effort in order to save my life, and at the same time make him continue to believe in me.
I opened my eyes and looked up at him, at first with a vacant stare. "She sold me with a Judas kiss!" I muttered, "a cursed traitress—with a Judas kiss. You've promised me my choice of deaths. You'll keep your word, Sir Charles, or by the God above us—you'll die a fouler death than I."
I gave him a look of such concentrated rage as I concluded, that, bound though I was, he started back a step and bit his lip.
"Well, well!" he exclaimed, "I'll keep my word, you need not fear."
"Then bring me a cross, and nail me to it—in my senses while I live, and while I bleed to death—you'll drag her here to see me—so that I may curse her as I die!"
"The man is mad!" he gasped, "mad as a March hare!"
"Keep your word!" furiously I hissed. "I bind you to your word!"
Sir Charles exchanged fearful glances with the negroes. I watched him, frowning like a thunder-cloud.