'At least leave me your dagger since you take the light.'
'Here, then.' Spigno unsheathed and surrendered the weapon to him.
Bellarion gripped the hilt. With very sombre eyes he considered the Count. Then the latter turned aside again for the lantern.
'A moment,' said Bellarion.
'What now?'
Impatiently Spigno faced once more the queer glance of those dark eyes, and in that moment Bellarion stabbed him.
It was a swift, hard-driven, merciful stroke that found the unfortunate man's heart and quenched his life before he had time to realise that it was threatened.
Without a sound he reeled back under the blow. Bellarion's left arm went round his shoulders to ease him to the ground. But Spigno's limbs sagged under him. He sank through Bellarion's embrace like an empty sack, and then rolled over sideways.
The murderer choked back a sob. His legs were trembling like empty hose with which the wind makes sport. His face was leaden-hued and his sight was blurred by tears. He went down on his knees beside the dead count, turned him on his back, straightened out the twitching limbs, and folded the arms across the breast. Nor did he rise when this was done.
In slaying Count Spigno, he had performed a necessary act; necessary in the service to which he had dedicated himself. Thus at a blow he had shattered the instrument upon which the Marquis Theodore was depending to encompass his nephew's ruin; and the discovery to-morrow of Spigno's death and Bellarion's own evasion, in circumstances of unfathomable mystery, must strike such terror into the hearts of the conspirators that there would probably be an end to the plotting which served no purpose but to advance the Regent's schemes.