"Siren! Enchantress! Sorceress! Who can deny you the gift of imagining or improvising vanities? Go, your heart is more bronze than is this lamp. Now that you fear falling into the power of others, you speak flattering words; before, in the presence of Inigo, you threatened and scorned, nor do I know whether you are more humble now than you were then insolent. For then you railed at me like a child; how presumptuously you chid me, as if you had not likewise derived your origin from Adam; nothing that ever belonged to me, would you consent to keep near you; you desired to erase me from your memory, and if you could safely, from life; with the greatest insults you threw the necklace of your husband about my neck, like the rope of a criminal, and a handful of money to heal the bleeding wounds of a broken heart. Ah! Let me silence for once the love that I feel for so mean, so base, so unfeeling a woman. The sight of others' cruelty makes me cruel. Why do I wait longer? Why not fly to declare your infamy to the Duke? Why not give myself at least the pleasure of seeing you hurled into the tomb by a dishonored and bloody death?"
"No, I will not go and accuse you; I will kill you."
"Kill me then."
"Accuse you! kill you! And what good will that do me? Ah no, Isabella! Your love, give me your love——"
"Back!"
"It is impossible! Impossible! You must be mine—one moment—then let death come—and hell——"
Thus speaking, he advanced towards Isabella to seize her; she retreated, and he followed. Isabella, breathless, saw no means of escape; she tried to commend herself to God, but doubted whether one so unworthy could be heard: she gave herself up for lost. Suddenly, over the shoulder of the Duchess appears a long, glittering blade; it comes quick as the lightning, and with one cruel thrust penetrates the bosom of Lelio and passes through. He takes one step back, clutching with upraised hands, like a drowning man, but cannot utter a single word; only a few indistinct mutterings escape him; the blood, gushing freely and foamingly from the wound, covers the lamp, and extinguishes the light; in the darkness could be heard the fall of the table, overturned by the force with which Torelli struck it, and the tottering, the sinking; and rolling on the floor of the unhappy man.
A cry burst from Isabella, so full of despairing agony, that it would have drowned any which Lelio could have uttered, if his heart, so horribly cleft in twain, had not deprived him at the same moment both of speech and life; and she then fell senseless to the floor, so that the spirit seemed to have left her also.
Isabella remained insensible for a long time; afterwards, when partially recovered, a voice seemed to reach her ears, a woman's voice, that of a weeping woman, which said: "Give me back my son:" and, as she could not reply, for her tongue refused its utterance, she seemed to hear the same voice add: "Be accursed! The blood of her who has caused blood to be shed shall be shed." Then Lelio seemed to appear before her with a vacant stare, a frightful wound, his face stained, and his hair matted with blood and dust, and fixed himself before her, but spoke not a word; for although she saw that he tried to move as if to articulate, he only succeeded in giving vent to a labored groan, and gathering within the hollow of his hand the dark blood oozing from his wound he cast it at her like a curse! Then Isabella recovered, and tried to sit up: at first, she did not dare to unclose her eyes; but at last, stimulated by courage or fear, she succeeded in opening them. What was this! She was lying in her own bed; the table was in the middle of the room, and the bronze lamp was burning, but with a pallid light. She sprang from her bed, took the lamp and fixed her eyes anxiously upon it, but saw no trace of blood in any of its cavities, nor even any trace that it had been washed off and dried, nor did it even seem as if it had been refilled with oil. With the lamp in her hand, although hesitatingly, she approached the mirror to see if her face were stained with blood, but it was the same as usual; she examined the table, the floor, but behold, all was as neat and dry as was wont. She knew not what to think; she floated in a tempest of fancies, and said to herself: "I have certainly dreamed:"—and as we are ever inclined to believe what is most agreeable and advantageous, so Isabella said again, "It was a dream; a fearful dream indeed! Who knows how many miles distant poor Lelio is by this time!" She had almost persuaded her mind to doubt the atrocious event.