“I have news of your daughter,” said I, resolved to speak straight to all that I knew she felt of love, and not to spare her. “She is dead!”
The stern figure scarcely trembled, but her hand sought the support of the door-post.
“I knew that she was dead,” said she, deep and low, and then was silent for an instant. “My tears that should have flowed for her were burnt up long years ago. Young man, tell me about her.”
“Not yet,” said I, having a strange power given me of confronting one, whom, nevertheless, in my secret soul I dreaded.
“You had once a little dog,” I continued. The words called out in her more show of emotion than the intelligence of her daughter’s death. She broke in upon my speech:—
“I had! It was hers—the last thing I had of hers—and it was shot for wantonness! It died in my arms. The man who killed that dog rues it to this day. For that dumb beast’s blood, his best-beloved stands accursed.”
Her eyes distended, as if she were in a trance and saw the working of her curse. Again I spoke:—
“O, woman!” I said, “that best-beloved, standing accursed before men, is your dead daughter’s child.”
The life, the energy, the passion, came back to the eyes with which she pierced through me, to see if I spoke truth; then, without another question or word, she threw herself on the ground with fearful vehemence, and clutched at the innocent daisies with convulsed hands.
“Bone of my bone! flesh of my flesh! have I cursed thee—and art thou accursed?”