"Is there absolutely no word of pardon or of kindness which you wish to send to those who have injured you, as a sort of legacy from the grave?"
"None!" he whispered fiercely.
"Suppose that your enemy should come to see you. Suppose that a great change had come over him; that he, too, had suffered deeply; that your wife had discovered his treachery and left him; that he had bitterly repented; that he had made such atonement as he could for his sin; that it was he who has been caring for you in these last hours, could you not pardon him?"
These words produced an extraordinary effect on the dying man. For the first time he identified his enemy with his friend, and as the discovery dawned upon his mind a convulsion seized and shook his frame. He slowly and painfully struggled to a sitting posture, lifted his right hand above his head and said in tones that rang with the raucous power of by-gone days:
"Curse him! If I had known that I was eating his b-b-bread, it would have choked me! Send him to me! Where is he?"
"I am here," said David, quietly entering the door. "I am here to throw myself on your mercy and to beg you, for the love of God, to forgive me."
As he heard the familiar voice, the beggar trembled. He made one last supreme effort to look out of his darkened eyes. An expression of despairing agony followed the attempt, and then, with both his great bony hands, he clutched at the throat of his night robe as if choking for breath, tore it open and reaching down into his bosom felt for some concealed object. He found it at last, grasped it and drew it forth. It was a shining blade of steel.
Mantel sprang to take it from his hand; but David pushed him back and said calmly, "Let him alone."
"Yes, let me alone," cried the blind man, trembling in every limb, and crawling slowly and painfully from the bed.
The movements of the dying man were too slow and weak to convey any adequate expression of the tempest raging in his soul. It was incredible that a tragedy was really being enacted, and that this poor trembling creature was thirsting for the lifeblood of a mortal foe.