‘Die then, since you prefer it,’ he said. ‘Thief, liar—adulteress.’
While, with a terrible cry, Fédore leapt off the couch.
‘A knife!’ she screamed. ‘Save me. He has a knife.’
And, as she ran towards us, I saw something narrow and bright flash downwards between her shoulders, and—a red spout of blood. Her knees gave under her. She lurched, flung up her arms, kneeling for an instant bolt upright, a world of agony and despair in her splendid eyes, and then, before either of us could reach her, fell back.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
Of the half-hour which followed I can give no coherent account. As I try to recall it, after the lapse of many years, details start into vivid relief, but without sequence or any clear relation of cause and effect.
I have an impression of helping Lavender to raise Fédore from the ground, and of his muttering—‘A foul blow, before God a foul blow,’ as we laid her, quivering but apparently unconscious, upon the couch. An impression of sultry, copper-coloured sunshine suddenly and harshly lighting up the disordered room, the grim assembly of men, and the woman’s pale recumbent figure, as with a glare of widespread conflagration. I have an impression of Marsigli, too, and that a very strange one, coolly holding out his hands—the right hand horribly splashed and stained—while Lavender clapped a pair of handcuffs on his wrists. The fury of primitive passion seemed assuaged in him by his hideous act of vengeance, and he had become impassive, courtly even in manner, as I remembered him when waiting on her Magnificence at table or ushering in her guests. He had given himself up, as I heard later, without any struggle or attempt at escape. But above all I have an impression, nauseating and to me indescribably dreadful, which—though I trust I am not unduly squeamish—I shall, I believe, carry with me to the day of my death, an impression of the sight, the sense, the smell of fresh shed blood. Upon that I will not dwell further, since, however deeply affecting to myself, it can serve no useful purpose.
Finally—summoned, I suppose, by the younger of Lavender’s underlings, who had reappeared after locking the servant, Marie, in some room below—a surgeon arrived. Then I slipped away downstairs and out into the comparatively cool untainted atmosphere of the shabby little garden. If I was wanted, they must call me. Not voluntarily could I witness a professional examination of what, less than an hour ago, had been a strong and very beautiful if very sinful woman, and was now but a helpless corpse.
All my thought had softened towards Fédore. Her evildoings—evil even in respect of her accomplice—were manifest. For, let us be just, Marsigli’s crime was not without provocation. But she had played for great stakes and had lost. The pathos of irremediable failure was upon her. And I was awe-stricken by the swiftness of her punishment, the relentless and appalling haste with which she had been thrust out of life. Into what uncharted regions of being had her astute, ambitious, and voluptuous spirit now passed? Regardless of the prohibitions of my Church, I prayed—and how earnestly!—her sins might be forgiven; and that through the Eternal Mercy—so far broader, deeper, more abiding, as I confidently believe, than any man-made definition of it—she might even yet find a place for repentance and peace at the last.