Again his fingers tightened; my breath was going.
Boggs stopped and began mopping his face with his handkerchief. The memory of the fight for his life seemed to have strangely affected him. No one of the coterie had ever seen him so stirred, and no one had ever dreamed that he could tell a story with so much real dramatic power. In the few moments in which he had been speaking the room was almost breathless except for the tones of his voice.
"Go on, Boggs, don't stop!" said Lonnegan.
"In the struggle for mastery the point of the dagger pressed against my heart. There came a sudden lunge—Oh, I guess, boys, I won't go any further; I never like to think of the affair. I'd no business to tell it; always affects me this way."
"Yes, go on; served the brute right," spoke up Mac.
"I tried, of course, to avoid it, but I was powerless. The knife went straight through my own heart, and I fell dead at his feet. That afternoon they threw my body in the pool. I have lain there ever since."
The listeners, one and all, glared at Boggs. The surprise had been so great that for an instant no one found his tongue. Then the fireside rang with shouts of laughter.