“Though the angels of God plead for his life, still must he die!”
“Then die, wronger and betrayer! Then die, midnight assassin and ravisher! The spirit of my mother nerves my arm and points the steel!”
And as the words fell from his lips, ere an arm could be raised, or a word of horror spoken, Guiseppo sprang to the very throat of the knight, grasping his long gray hair with one hand, while with the other he inserted the glittering dagger between the armor plates of his victim, and drove the steel down from the left shoulder to the very heart.
It was the work of a moment; the lightning flash might not be swifter, nor the thunderbolt more sudden.
One instant the spectators beheld the kneeling youth, and the warrior waving his hand with stern determination, as he turned from the prayer of mercy; the next moment their eyes were startled by the upraised dagger, and the blow of vengeance.
The knight tottered heavily to and fro, looked vacantly around, and then sank into the arms of Robin the Rough, with the haft of the dagger protruding from the armor plates of his left shoulder.
“Father!” shrieked Guiseppo, shaking wildly above his head, the right hand, the hand that winged the dagger. “Father, my mother is avenged; behold the doom of the ravisher!”
“Thou hast done well!” spoke Aldarin, in a quiet, yet trembling tone, while his lips wore an even smile. “Boy, thou hast done well! Now, Guiseppo, read, read the pacquet—the pacquet in thy bosom.”
And while the horror-stricken spectators—Robin the Rough, the figures in sable robes, the peasant-vassals, and the men-at-arms—remained awed into a fearful silence by the scene,—the silence that ever precedes the march of death,—Guiseppo thrust his hand within his bosom, drew the pacquet from its resting place, and with his trembling fingers broke the seal.
“Man of guilt and bloodshed,” exclaimed the dying knight, as he convulsively placed his hands on the wound near his heart. “I am dying—my heart grows cold, and mine eyes are dim—thy vengeance is gratified; now, now, tell me—”