His companion was a Catholic priest, the tones of whose voice, as he spoke in soothing accents to the condemned, were soft and clear as those of a woman.
The prisoner spoke, and his voice sounded dull and hollow. Hope was extinguished in his soul, and all the lighter inflections which express the varied emotions stirring within us, had ceased to vary the monotonous sounds which issued from his lips. A few more hours, and for him Time would have ceased to revolve. What then had he to do with human aspirations—with human joys? Nothing: his fate on earth was known—an outlaw's life, a felon's death!
The prisoner folded his manacled hands over his breast, and said:
"Why should I seek to prolong my wretched existence by asking such a commutation of my sentence? Death is but one pang, whereas solitary confinement for life, to which I should probably be doomed, would be a living torture. To live forever alone! Think what that must be even to a man innocent of crime, and feel how far worse than the bed of Procrustes it must be to one like me. No, holy father, let me die before the time appointed by Nature. Thus let the tender mercies of my race toward me be consummated."
"You are reckless, my son," said the priest, mildly. "Think how far worse it will be to face an offended Judge in your present mood, than to live for repentance."
"Repentance!" repeated the prisoner, in the same passionless manner; "that is ever the jargon of your cloth, father: you condemn a man without adverting to the motives, which, in his view, often sanctify the act."
The priest looked at him rebukingly. As if the slumbering energies of his impetuous nature were suddenly aroused by that look, the prisoner started from his seat; his pale features glowed; his eyes sparkled with fury, as he exclaimed: "Yes, I would again trample the life out of the wretch who murdered my love by deception and ill-treatment with as little, ay, with less compunction than if he had planted his dagger in her heart."
He covered his face with his hands, and large tears fell over them. Passionless as he was, the priest was touched by this overwhelming emotion in one who had hitherto been so passive. He laid his hand on the sufferer's arm, and kindly said: "Tell me, my son, how it was."
Melting beneath the voice of friendly sympathy, the murderer wept like a child. When he became calmer, he said:—
I will give you the history of my life, and you may judge me: