He raved with real madness now. Great drops of perspiration gathered on his face. He dared not face those beautiful eyes so calmly gazing at him. Where had high Heaven gained such knowledge of him? How could God punish him with such awful cruelty?
"Hell and damnation have come," he screamed in frantic terror. The thunder rolled in deep majesty, and none heard him. The wind and rain beat upon the house, and his ravings disturbed no one.
"Take it away! Take it away!" he cried in sheer madness and agony.
It would not move. The lightning only made the picture more startling and awful. The sweet and beautiful face of Alice Green lived before him in frightful distinctness, and his very soul seemed to burn to cinder before her serene, unearthly presence.
It was her ghost revisiting the earth. Was it to always thus torment him?
"Thank God! It has gone."
The room became pitch dark, and he fell back upon the pillow in what seemed to him a bloody sweat. He could not sleep, and for some time he lay trembling on the bed and trying to collect his senses and decide whether he was in possession of his reason or not.
Suddenly there was a flash of light, and a new vision sprang into existence before him.
An angel in long white robes seemed to be flying through the air toward him, and above her head she held a sword. Beneath her feet was the word "Nemesis!" in letters of glowing fire.
The poor wretch rose up in bed, kneeled down upon the mattress, and facing the gigantic figure that seemed to float in the air above him, cried aloud in broken gasps.