That evening, in the dusk, a woman knocked at Tom Liffey’s door. He opened it.
“Are you alone”? she said. “I am alone, lady.”
“I will come in,” she added. “You will—come in”? he faltered.
She drew near him, and reached out and gently caught his hand.
“Ah!” he said, with a sound almost like a sob in its intensity, and the blood flushed to his hair.
He stepped aside, and she entered. In the light of the candle her eye burned into his, but her face wore a shining coldness. She leaned towards him.
“You said you could worship me,” she whispered, “and you cursed him. Well—worship me—altogether—and that will curse him, as he has killed me.”
“Dear lady!” he said, in an awed, overwhelmed murmur; and he fell back to the wall.
She came towards him. “Am I not beautiful”? she urged. She took his hand. His eye swam with hers. But his look was different from hers, though he could not know that. His was the madness of a man in a dream; hers was a painful thing. The Furies dwelt in her. She softly lifted his hand above his head, and whispered: “Swear.” And she kissed him. Her lips were icy, though he did not think so. The blood tossed in his veins. He swore: but, doing so, he could not conceive all that would be required of him. He was hers, body and soul, and she had resolved on a grim thing.... In the darkness, they left the hut and passed into the woods, and slowly up through the hills.
Heldon returned to his home that night to find it empty. There were no servants. There was no wife. Her cat and dog lay dead upon the hearthrug. Her clothing was cut into strips. Her wedding-dress was a charred heap on the fireplace. Her jewellery lay molten with it. Her portrait had been torn from its frame.