El-Râmi’s eyes flashed indignant amazement and wrath.
“Féraz!—What do you mean?”
With a fierce impulsive movement Féraz turned and fully faced him,—all his forced and feigned calmness gone to the winds,—a glowing picture of youth and beauty and rage commingled.
“What do I mean?” he cried—“I mean this! That I am tired of being your slave—your ‘subject’ for conjurer’s tricks of mesmerism,—that from henceforth I resist your power,—that I will not serve you—will not obey you—will not yield—no!—not an inch of my liberty—to your influence,—that I am a free man, as you are, and that I will have the full rights of both my freedom and manhood. You shall play no more with me; I refuse to be your dupe as I have been. This is what I mean!—and as I will have no deception or subterfuge between us,—for I scorn a lie,—hear the truth from me at once;—I know your secret—I have seen Her!”
El-Râmi stood erect,—immovable;—he was very pale; his breath came and went quickly—once his hand clenched, but he said nothing.
“I have seen Her!” cried Féraz again, flinging up his arms with an ecstatic wild gesture—“A creature fairer than any vision!—and you—you have the heart to bind her fast in darkness and in nothingness,—you it is who have shut her sight to the world,—you have made for her, through your horrible skill, a living death in which she knows nothing, feels nothing, sees nothing, loves nothing! I tell you it is a cursed deed you are doing,—a deed worse than murder—I would not have believed it of you! I thought your experiments were all for good,—I never would have deemed you capable of cruelty to a helpless woman! But I will release her from your spells,—she is too beautiful to be made her own living monument,—Zaroba is right—she needs life—joy—love!—she shall have them all;—through me!”
He paused, out of breath with the heat and violence of his own emotions;—El-Râmi stood, still immovably regarding him.
“You may be as angered as you please”—went on Féraz with sullen passion—“I care nothing now. It was Zaroba who bade me go up yonder and see her where she slept; ... it was Zaroba——”
“‘The woman tempted me and I did eat—’” quoted El-Râmi coldly,—“Of course it was Zaroba. No other than a woman could thus break a sworn word. Naturally it was Zaroba,—the paid and kept slave of my service, who owes to me her very existence,—who persuaded my brother to dishonour.”
“Dishonour!” and Féraz laid his hand with a quick, almost savage gesture on the hilt of the dagger at his belt. El-Râmi’s dark eyes blazed upon him scornfully.